Bathroom again!

Nah, just kidding. I noticed that the most comments were left on my bathroom posts. I want to talk about Lebanon instead.

Here's betting that nobody leaves a comment besides those who just want to spite me. hehe.

What is the "root cause" of the conflict, as the US and UK says and commend to eradicate? How's about going back way back when someone... um... US and UK... drew lines on a map of the Middle East and created the state known as Israel? Now... I'm a am a big fan of dealing with what is now, so I shall not go back to the root cause. But the irony is certainly not being touched by the mass media. Oh, while I'm at drawing maps: Iraq, Kuwait, Jordan, etc were all drawn up.

As Spiderman's uncle once said, with great power, comes great responsibility. What the great power has done so far in his 6 years of governance is great responsibilities forgotten.

In asymmetric warfare (i.e. two sides of very different levels of capabilities), the smaller force has to find gaps to strike the bigger force. And because it cannot afford to line up troops on the same field and get run over, it has to attack where the larger force fears. Civilians, therefore, come into the line of fire. There is no justification for this, obviously, but as a smaller force in asymmetric warfare, they may not have much of a choice and will face defeat if they do not resort to these tactics. I am not defending organizations such as Hamas and Hezbollah; merely stating an obvious that I learned from Fletcher a few years back.

On the other hand, the larger force has to eliminate where the small force can inflict damage. That means pushing back Hezbollah from the borders. Airstrikes are very much necessary. Facing a almost guerilla enemy, blanket bombarding might be a viable tactic that will cost little in terms of military lives. Then again, I'm not defending the IDF.

What happens is naturally both sides have civilian casualties. One incident has stood out so far: the bombing of a Qana village in which many villagers seeking shelter were killed in an airstrike. I don't want to get into whether Israel was justified to do what it did... but consider this: what if this happened in Israel? A Hezbollah rocket hits a building with Israel civilians, killing many including children.

What would the great power with great responsibility do?

What hurts me most is that we claim to be civilized and with values that terrorists are trying to defeat, we sometimes employ terrorist tactics and mentalities: that it's okay to bomb them because we're defending ourselves. True, perhaps... but the enemy is thinking the same thing. In order to defend themselves (a.k.a. poverty, says Colin Powell), terrorists need to make potential recruits believe that they need to join a terrorist organization. Every time the great powers act in favor of Israel (or anything against the Islam world), it is fuel for the terrorist.

Please use the great power for greater responsibility.