Density Unparalleled

Well, this was inevitable.

The other day Israeli bombardment along the Lebanese border accidentally hit a UN peacekeeping post, emptying four blue helmets, two of whom were Canadian. And as you might expect given the viciously anti-Israel tilt of the "international community," Turtle Bay was not happy about it, with King Kofi going so far as to accuse the Jewish state of deliberately targeting UN "forces."

Fortunately, Canada is led by a prime minister these days who isn't a raving idiot. Steven Harper wasn't buying Annan's anti-Semitic slander and acknowledged, reasonably, that the incident was a mistake. A fact expanded upon by retired Major-General Lewis MacKenzie:

"...the tragic loss of a soldier yesterday who I happen to know and I think probably is from my Regiment. We've received e-mails from him a few days ago and he described the fact that he was taking within - in one case - three meters of his position "for tactical necessity - not being targeted". Now that's veiled speech in the military and what he was telling us was Hizbullah fighters were all over his position and the IDF were (sic) targeting them and that's a favorite trick by people who don't have representation in the UN. They use the UN as shields knowing that they can't be punished for it." [emphases added]

And that the Israelis will be, instead.

Incidentally, David Frum tells us a little bit more about General MacKenzie:

For those who want to evaluate these claims, let me add something: Lewis Mackenzie is one of the most admired officers in the Canadian army, a veteran of operations in the former Yugoslavia. He was often thought of in the 1990s as a likely future prime minister, and it would surprise nobody if he were appointed Canada's next governor general. In other words: a very, very serious person.

Given the choice of believing his words or those of the man at the center of the oil-for-food scandal ... well it's an easy call.

Bear that in mind when you read of King Kofi "accepting" the explanation of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert that the attack had been an error and not a deliberate strike at the UN.

Frankly, though, you almost couldn't blame the Israelis if they had targeted the "peacekeeper" outpost. Really, could the "world"'s hostility to them get much worse? And this after the Jews having done everything asked of them over the past fifteen years: negotiating with Yassir Arafat, the whole misbegotten Oslo process, handing over the West Bank to their Palestinian blood enemies, abandoning Gaza. And their reward for all this "good global citizenship"? Two intifadas and now a two-front war against Islamist proxie armies with Iran trying to goad them into a full-blown regional war. And with rockets and missiles raining down on their cities, their homes, their loved ones, it is the Israelis that are ordered by King Kofi to "stop the violence." It really is chutzpah of astonishing proportions.

But rest assured it's matched by UN stupidity. Ask yourself this salient question: Why would Hezbollah cluster their terrorists and weapons emplacements around UN peacekeeper positions? There can be only two logical answers: (1) Either the peacekeepers were unwilling to defend themselves against this hostile encroachment or (2) they were unable.

No demerits for guessing (1), but the answer is (2). That's right, the UN sent their blue helmets into a war zone unarmed. How on United Earth did they expect any "peace" to be "kept" when their (ha ha) forces had no means of imposing their will on those who would make war? Or to keep the latter (i.e. Hezbollah) from using them as unwilling (?) military assets against the IDF?

Cap'n Ed asks why Annan didn't order the evacuation of his blue helmets from south Lebanon after hostilities erupted. That's easier to answer - the UN knew that leaving peacekeepers in the war zone would lead to precisely such collateral casualties as were suffered the other day, and that would be a golden, ready-made pretext for more anti-Israel propaganda. Or, in other words, they were human shields for King Kofi as much as they were for Hezbollah.

I think Bob Tyrrell speaks for a lot of us today with the following evisceration. I know he speaks for me:

Israel is being diabolized by governments that have year after year, atrocity after atrocity, become inured to the growing barbarism of the terrorists' notion of war. The terrorists wear no uniforms and are governed by no nation of laws, yet they expect to be treated as soldiers. They, as a matter of policy, attack defenseless civilians and employ suicide bombers to kill by ambuscade yet expect to be covered by the Geneva Accords. They act like madmen yet demand to be treated as though they were rational and reasonable. The "international community" goes along with all these nihilistic expectations and demands. Those who oppose this drift into barbarism are treated as the aggressors.

Frankly by comparison with the international community of appeasers in the 1930s today's appeasers are more cowardly and corrupt.