The Mess: What’s next?..and does anyone really care?

Let’s try to back away from hate for a bit, and look at the current situation realistically.

Israel has rights, Palestine has rights, and Lebanon is a sovereign country. But all factions have gone over the edge now, and the whole world is staring into the proverbial abyss together. There doesn’t seem to be an exit strategy for any party. It’s what we call in the U.S. a "Mexican Standoff". No winners possible.

My concern is with the poor guys in the middle of this conflict; shop owners, students, housewives, tourists and just plain everyday folks who have no "dog" in this hunt.

George Bush, making one of his nuttiest and most illogical statements in months, today told reporters that he’s asking Israel to guard against excessive civilian casualties! Yes!..he actually said that! War criminal Dubya, he who is directly responsible...in the name of "freedom" of causing an estimated 150,000++ civilian maimings or deaths just in Iraq over the last 3 years!

If you listen to the nightly network news it’s plain that this statement by Bush went right over their heads. No response. Nobody seems to care about anything. They don’t care how violent Israel gets, declaring their preemptive action on Lebanon. They don’t care about what Israel has done to the Gaza population, and they don’t see that Israel is goading Iran into an open war. On the other side of the coin, Hezbollah and Hamas aren’t doing the world any favors. They seem to have begun these actions and now pretend it’s all Israel’s fault.

I am a gentile, and a European, so have no side to take here. I try hard to remain neutral, but injustice grates me to my bones and when I see kids and women getting killed because two violent factions want the total destruction of one another, as did Rome and Carthage...I cringe and shed some silent tears for our old world.

We’re in for a long "slog" (as Rumsfeld is prone to say), and it’s clear that the basic blame can be laid directly on the Bush administration’s doorstep. They have been ignorant, insincere..AND belligerant from the get go. In the end, whatever happens (and it will be horrible) will be their fault. The world simply can’t tolerate or afford much more of this crass indifference...and meddling in other’s affairs via insane hegemonic policies.

In the meantime, however, all we can do is sit and watch and hope WE aren’t next.

It’s likely we are.