Mid-East Crisis Outcome...

Mid-East Crisis Outcome: Pride or Humiliation!

Ali-Asghar Kazemi
15 August 2006
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Finally the United Nations Security Council adopted Resolution 1701 for cessation of hostilities in the ill-fated Middle East crisis. Indeed, this crisis will be remembered as one the most foolish calamities and darkest page of our current history. While the blood of innocent victims is still fresh and bright on the soils of warring parties, wicked politicians on the one side and unscrupulous media showbiz on the other are stupidly counting the scores on each side to determine the loser and winner of the war; as they do for a football game.

Asking about the victor in this unfortunate war is like querying about the winner in a terrible earthquake, though wars should not be considered as natural and unavoidable phenomena of human interactions. There is no doubt in a sane mind that this kind of war has no victor but only losers who are only the innocent and helpless people of Lebanon and Israel who suffered because of absurdity, miscalculation and mismanagement of politicians.

As I argued in my previous comments at the beginning and during the hostilities, this crisis, disregard of the circumstances of its initiation and occurrence, could be handled without much difficulty and trouble. But for some dubious and obscure reasons, it started with cruelty and ended too late and with extensive bloodshed, destruction and unnecessary violence; while it could be contained and stopped by the U.N. Security Council and other big powers at the very beginning.

Permanent members of the Council should be blamed and morally held responsible for this delay. Israeli politicians and military commanders too should be accountable for their disproportionate reactions and unnecessary inflictions of damages to Lebanese civilian populations and infrastructures. This is not to say that Hezbollah indiscriminate attacks on Israel’s undefended cities and populations are legitimate by any legal or humanitarian measures. The international community and humanitarian institutions have the unquestionable duty and standing to bring the case to the International Criminal Court (ICC) or other relevant tribunals for eventual prosecution and should not leave these actions unrequited.

Now that a fragile cease-fire is established, it is necessary that the world as a whole, especially the great powers and rich states of the region, quickly contribute to the reconstruction of war-torn Lebanon before the cold seasons start.

Neither Israel nor Hezbollah and their supporters should be proud of what happened during the 33 days of destructions and bloodshed in this region. On the contrary, all feuding parties involved in this catastrophe should be ashamed of the way they handled this unfortunate crisis. The international community also has to learn many lessons from this entanglement. I shall elaborate on this latter in my future comments. /