Nasra-llah Getting Ready to Throw in the Towel

Nasra-llah is so predictable. He attacked Israel without thinking that they would have a strong reaction. He thought that they would be bullied into peace talks, which are to no avail with terrorist groups like Hezba-llah (and Hamas). He was caught off guard big time when Israel started launching missiles like crazy, but his war face had already been put on and he had to continue fighting lest he look like a weak loser and be ousted by terrorists more extreme than him (this is a great way to end your career and is a terrorist's worst dream). He held on as long as he could, and still is, perhaps thinking that international pressure or Israeli desires to negotiate would cause the bombing to stop and allow him to continue his own bombing. Tonight I saw that Nasra-llah had said that he will continue to bomb Israel, but said immediately after that he will stop bombing cities and towns if Israel does. It would be damaging to his career to go out without a bang, so he had to get one last threat in there before getting in his request for the bombings to stop. Rule number one with Arab terrorists; don't believe the hype. The news also said that Iran has asked him to cease firing. Perhaps the Arab states have a say in this pressure, or perhaps the death count in Lebanon has finally gotten high enough for him to call it off. In other words, he is saying "Please stop bombing us," his bluff has reached its end.

Or has it? This could also be a part of his lying campaign; once Israel stops, he might start up again (although that would be extremely stupid but let's not overestimate this terrorist). Israel says that it won't pull its ground troops out of southern Lebanon (they have reached the Litani River, relatively north) until the UN steps in to fill the vaccuum that they'll leave. One potential problem with the UN solution; it's peacekeepers are not allowed to fire, which in effect makes their presence symbolic and not very useful, and this would mean that the UN is not a solution. It might even mean that the UN peacekeepers will be attacked by Hezba-llah and will have to leave. All in all, if the UN goes in there it better have some bite or the fighting will continue; sometimes peacekeepers have to fight too. There is no way to predict for sure what will happen when and if the UN goes in there, but there was an instance three years ago when Hezba-llah kindnapped three different Israeli soldiers and the UN peacekeepers were filmed reportedly allowing Hezba-llah fighters to put the soldiers in a van and to drive away.

People were beginning to get antsy with and crictical of Israel's bombing in Lebanon but I said then that it had to continue and eventually Nasra-llah's bluff would be called and he would back out, and tonight that began to occur.

My mom, a native of Israel and raised there, seems to dish up some amazingly accurate analyses of Israeli politics, and she is not a student of politics or extremely interested in it. Rather, she has been through the '56, '67, '73, and '82 wars with Egypt ('56), Egypt, Syria, and Jordan ('67), Egypt ('73), and Lebanon ('82) respectively and also served for three years when she turned 18, like all Israeli's. She just got back here after moving back to Israel following my parents' divorce about a year ago for my sister's wedding (in two weeks, todah la'Kel). She said that Israel made a mistake with Lebanon; every two years or so they bomb Lebanon so that they can't load up on their stockpile of weapons; this time around they went six years without doing that and this is the result. What? She's been counting the years? Is the two year period that reliable? Turns out that my mom has been internally waiting for the two-year period, like some kind of barometer -- I pail in comparison to the coolness of my mom. She's not even rightwing but rather quite apolitical, but she has been though four wars with the Arab states starting with the year of her birth. She also said that the border with Lebanon and even with Gaza used to be such a safe border (I visited it with my family when I was thirteen) and shows that Israel has "been sleeping" due to the fact that Hezba-llah was able to snatch a soldier after crossing that border and the blue line. She said the same about Gaza. Yashar ko'ach, Mom, and yasar ko'ach G-d for listening to my prayers this Tisha B'Av and before, which were as follows:

Please let this be the last war and let the Meshiach come.
Let all our soldiers come back safely.
Put your Hand on the innocent Lebanese.
Kill the members of Hezba-llah.
May Israel continue to bomb Lebanon until Nasra-llah backs down, no ceasefire and no listening to useless criticism.
May Nasra-llah die quickly.