southchild

Victor Davis Hanson has another excellent essay on the Israeli-Hezbollah war, “Worry About the West — Not Israel”. Unfortunately, his assessment is right-on. It is we — the West — who are wallowing in the muck of moral confusion, political correctness, and outright denial.

There is a depressing pattern here. The sources for Western erroneous reports and faked pictures always seem to exaggerate the damage to Lebanon — but never to Israel.

Likewise, Western news agencies rarely list a precise number of Hezbollah losses, instead lumping them in with civilian fatalities. Does that mean that someone who launches a missile in Levis and sneakers is not a combatant?

In addition, the history and nature of Hezbollah do not matter to many in the West.

Knowingly or not, news outlets continue to spread Hezbollah’s propaganda. One wonders if Westerners remember or know that, until Sept. 11, Hezbollah had killed more Americans than had any other terrorist organization.

Most ignore as well that Hezbollah precipitated the present crisis by kidnapping and killing Israeli soldiers, and launching missiles against Israel’s cities.

Last week, Hanson warned us that the West is on the brink of moral insanity. This week, we’ve discovered that, as Hezbollah is merely an exported extension of Iran’s army, the Western media establishment is little more than an exported extension of the Hezbollah propaganda machine. These are not encouraging revelations but instead point to a systemic failure of the West to rationally comprehend and react to the threat of Islamic fascism.

Rather than worry about Israel, we need to get out of their way and let them do the job (we’re talking to you, President Bush). To get our own house in order, we must recognize the mess. Hanson concludes

The Western press — usually so careful to condemn hate speech — is utterly silent about Arab racism. But a European paper recently published a cartoon portraying Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert as a Nazi, secure that no rabbi would issue threats that could cost the editors their heads.

Still, when this is all over, we should not worry about the survival of Israel. For weeks, pundits have been lecturing how canny and adept Hezbollah has proved — and how a clumsy Israel could only respond by destroying Lebanon’s infrastructure. Yet, when the dust settles, the world will learn that Lebanon outside Hezbollah’s domain is not destroyed. And, one hopes, those who have suffered in the Hezbollah-controlled south will reexamine their support for a terrorist organization that has brought them — and itself — to near ruin.

Instead far more worrisome is the moral crisis in the West itself. If so many of its politicians, intellectuals and media will not or cannot fathom moral differences in this war, they will hardly be able to see them anywhere else.

Well worth the read.

This entry was posted on Thursday, August 10th, 2006 at 2:08 pm and is filed under General, politics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.