An "unparalleled, hellish plot". posted by Richard Seymour

I can only marvel at those who seriously pretend that this aggression by Israel has to do with an existential threat to that country, as one contemptible Israeli 'peacenik' did in The Observer yesterday (the article was entitled 'Voices from Across the Divide', and the voices unmistakeably said 'Death to the Arabs'). For this unctuous berk, it's World War III - and, of course, the Arabs are cast as the Axis, and it's all very very tough for Israel, so tough that "Our job now is to survive". Interestingly, what he describes as the Israeli far right position, that this war happened because Israel pulled out of Lebanon (even though it did not), is the publicly avowed position of the Chief Rabbi in Britain. Amos Oz is harped on the same theme of Israel's right-to-butcher-Arabs a couple of weeks ago.

Of course, imperialists always imagine that they are the victims of 'semite' or 'negro' or 'Hindoo' perfidy. When a slave rebellion was discovered to be fermenting on Antigua in 1793, the British masters were astonished by this "unparalleled, hellish plot" and had the conspirators broken on the wheel and gibbetted (hung in cages to die slowly of thirst and hunger). Lebanon is being broken on the wheel, Palestine is being gibbetted, and the sin is much the same: Hezbollah demands thousands of kidnapped Lebanese returned to Lebanon as well as the complete eviction of Israeli occupiers from the land, and will fight for it; Hamas, Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, PFLP, DFLP and others will not accept the attempt at politicide, and will fight to defend Palestine.

So look how far the West will go. Another day, another massacre. Look again. An attack on an aid route is an attack on the civilian population. They know it. They're going to smoke em out, starve em out, thirst em out, and blow em up. Here's more: IDF plans attacks on key infrastructure in Lebanon. They are openly advertising that they intend to destroy the infrastructure: I'm not even sure what's left to destroy, but the IDF are loudly proclaiming their intent to commit further war crimes.

Now, here's the thing. Hezbollah's capturing of the soldiers is always returned to. It is the key reference point, the 'attack' that legitimises for the 'international community' every barbarous thing that Israel is doing. So, what is this?:

From the Report of the Secretary-General on the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (For the period from 21 January 2006 to 18 July 2006)
23. Persistent 'and provocative Israeli air incursions, occasionally reaching deep into Lebanese airspace and generating sonic booms over populated areas, remained a matter of serious concern. The pattern identified in my previous reports continued, whereby the aircraft would sometimes fly out to sea and enter Lebanese airspace north of the UNIFIL area of operation, thus avoiding direct observation and verification by UNIFIL. The air incursions violate Lebanon's sovereignty and territorial integrity, elevate tension and disrupt the fragile calm along the Blue Line. A reduction in the number of air incursions in April contributed to an atmosphere of relative calm along the Blue Line, but this trend was reversed in May.
24. There were no instances of Hizbollah anti-aircraft fire across the Blue Line during the reporting period.
25. UNIFIL recorded a number of Lebanese ground violations of the Blue Line, primarily by shepherds. Such violations had become an almost daily routine, often involving the same local shepherds. o n I February; IDF killed a Lebanese shepherd.. UNIFIL had urged the Lebanese authorities to take concrete measures on the ground to prevent such violations, particularly by shepherds in the Shab'a farms area. Meanwhile, UNIFIL and Observer Group Lebanon patrols warned the local population about the danger of crossing the Blue Line.

The aggression, the criminality, the murderous deviance of racial supremacists, imperialists, colonists, slave-drivers and so on is invisible to them because they see it as natural. Churchill saw no wrong in the Native Americans being exterminated or the Aboriginal population of Australia being slowly wiped out, and he saw no wrong in Palestine being re-settled by what he called the 'National Jew' (a safe bulwark against the 'International Jew', who was always stirring things up in his view). Abraham Lincoln accepted along with the Confederates that the white man was superior, but simply thought that there was no need to be so explicit or brutal about it. Rabbi Yaacov Perrin said that "one million Arabs are not worth one Jewish fingernail", while the Yesha Rabbinical Council asserts that there are no 'innocents' in Lebanon. Menachem Begin could not begin to make peace with the Palestinians because of his Nazi-like racial views. Ehud Olmert thinks the same, but doesn't need to say it openly. For mainstream Zionist thought, the Arabs are no better than insects. So their ruthless, brutal, daily aggression and murderousness does not bother them, does not perturb them, does not disturb one iota their sense of themselves as being morally superior, pacifically minded and so on, because it is seen as natural.