The decision to quickly ship the weapons to Israel was made with relatively little debate within the Bush administration, the officials said. Its disclosure threatens to anger Arab governments and others because of the appearance that the United States is actively aiding the Israeli bombing campaign in a way that could be compared to Iran’s efforts to arm and resupply Hezbollah.Angering Arab governments? What are they talking about? The Arab governments have come out strongly against Hezbollah. They’re all scared to death of Iran’s violent rhetoric and have no intention of assisting Iran’s client state, Syria. There are two increasingly polarized camps in the Middle East and it’s no longer Israel vs. the rest.
Put yourself in the shoes of the Saudis. They have money, power and lives of luxury. The last thing they want is some bunch of maniacs bringing instability to the region. Saudi Arabia and the others have no illusions about attacking Israel ever again. Michael Medved’s notions of Israeli land grabs aside, they’re also not concerned about an imperial Israel taking over the region. All they want is stability so they can enjoy their bank accounts. If they have to pay off the Palestinians from time to time and a pizza parlor in Tel Aviv gets blown up, well that’s fine. At least it wasn’t a pizza parlor in Riyadh.
With all that in mind, why would they care whether or not Israel gets resupplied? The bombs will be used against Iran’s puppet terrorists, and the Arab world will be far better off with less of them around. Sure, they’ll tut-tut about it and make fussy pronouncements to the media, but the die was cast when they came out and publicly chastised Hezbollah at the start of this whole thing.
That brings me to another thought. The Europeans are in a real quandary. Fanciful notions of the EU being a counterweight to America notwithstanding, they’re playing to the guys with the oil. They can’t very well come out and take a side against the Saudis. I would bet that’s why the one thing the G8 could agree on was criticism of Hezbollah. Supporting Israel and Saudi Arabia means domestic unrest from their pro-Palestinian immigrants. What a mess. It couldn't happen to a nicer bunch of guys.
Yesterday’s Wall Street Journal had a great article on possible internal motivations driving Syria’s support for Hezbollah.
Syria faces serious economic problems at home -- unemployment and poverty are rising, while oil reserves are about to run dry -- the pro-Hezbollah foreign policy provides the regime with a convenient rallying cry to shore up support among citizens.That pipeline of missiles from Syria to Hezbollah won’t last forever. The timing of the attacks may have coincided with purges in Syria and the feeling that it was now or never.
The state-dominated economy is stagnating, and the Baath party, after tentative steps of economic overhaul, appears to have slowed down the pace. The economy is dominated by inefficient industrial and agricultural production, while oil, which Syria has long used to finance its bloated public sector, could run out as early as 2008, presenting the government with serious economic problems, particularly among the restive, unemployed youth. "A potential crisis is around the corner, because of oil," says Mr. Sukkar, the economic consultant.For the Saudis and their friends, Israel blowing Hezbollah into the hereafter is the best of all worlds. It depletes Syria’s stock of ammunition that could be used against them if Syria ever went critical and best of all, someone else is doing all the dirty work for them.
Other bloggers discussing this:
The Real Ugly American, who rocks vigorously, has a great post.
All Things Beautiful has a great bit of artwork followed by an artful post.
The Partisan Times has a good one, too.
Hyscience connects the dots.
Captain's Quarters goes to town on this, too.
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