From Democracy Now:
40% Of Israelis Disapprove of War in Lebanon
Polls in Israel show support for Prime Minister Ehud Olmert’s handling of the war is plummeting. 40 percent of Israelis now disapprove of the war and less than half
support Olmert’s handling of the war.
"Israeli Peace Group: 'Nothing Has Been Gained in This Foolish War.'
On Sunday the Israeli peace group Gush Shalom took out an ad in the pages of Haaretz. It read: 'A mountain of suffering has turned into an anthill of achievements. Nothing has been gained in this foolish war. Every drop of blood that is being shed now is being shed in vain.' UN Human Rights Council Condemns Israel
On Friday the United Nations Human Rights Council condemned Israel for violating human rights and international humanitarian law in its military operations in Lebanon. The council voted to send a high-level commission to the area to investigate the "systematic targeting and killing" of Lebanese civilians by Israel. This is UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Louise Arbour Louise Arbour: "The deaths of hundreds of civilians in documented and corroborated incidents, involving either random or targeted attacks on civilian vehicles or buildings, strongly suggest the indiscriminate use of force.” Amnesty International and other groups criticized the UN Human Rights Council for not also condemning Hezbollah’s attacks on Israeli civilians.
From Frost Illustrated
"Entering the fourth week of war between Lebanon's Hezbollah militia and Israel, the George W. Bush administration's ambitions to transform the Arab Middle East into a pro-Western, more democratic region are fading fast.
"'Not only is Washington's thusfar staunch support for Israel losing Arab 'hearts and minds' at an astonishing pace, but the 'moderate' governments and non-governmental forces which the administration had hoped would act as catalysts for reform are increasingly isolated across the region, according to Middle East specialists.
"'I have never seen the United States being so demonized or savaged by Arab commentators, by Arab politicians,' Hisham Melham, veteran Washington correspondent for Lebanon's AnNahar newspaper, told a conference two weeks ago at the Brookings Institution, an influential think tank. 'People are clinging to Hezbollah, clinging to Hamas, because they see them as the remaining voices or forces in the Arab world that are resisting what they see as an ongoing hegemonic American-Israeli plan to control the region.'
"'Right now, the United States is the kiss of death,' Shibley Telhami, an expert on Arab public opinion at the University of Maryland, observed at the same meeting.
"'If you really are trying to empower the ruling elites and nudge them to reform and be more representative, you have to deliver policies that are going to empower,' he said. 'What we see in Lebanon is a policy that is not empowering them. It is widening the gap (between the moderate elites and the people), and people are moving toward the militants.'"
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