Before the 1967 war there were UN peacekeepers in the Sinai. They got yanked out - I seem to recall at the instigation of the Soviet Union and the Arabs, and clearly to facilitate an attack on Israel. So, I agree that the UN should be involved, but even back then they could not be trusted. I’m a big fan of the UN in principle, (not in current practice) but one must be realistic.
The UN had peacekeepers in Lebanon. That sure worked out well.
On the other hand, the U.N. serves a useful purpose as an early warning system. You know something heavy’s coming down when the UN trooops bug out. They’re like a canary in a coal mine.
That was sort of my point, Sam. No one takes the UN seriously because they don’t back up their resolutions.
The US passed resoultion 1559 2 years ago calling for the disarmament of Hezbollah in Lebanon. What did that accomplish?
The Senate and the House, in overwhelmingly bipartisan support of Israel, respectfully disagrees with you and agrees with Condi. Congress Is Giving Israel Vote of Confidence
That would be the UN, not the US. :smack:
There’s a shocker. The Republican congress backing Bush’s foreign policy decisions? Say it ain’t so!
So, Lebanon not doing anything about Hezbollah is reprehensible and their citizens deserve to be killed, but us giving Israel a wink and a nod to do whatever they will, no matter who is killed, is perfectly ok. Just so we’re clear.
Do you know what the word “unanimously” means? The House measure had 8 “no” votes, btw.
:rolleyes: If you think that’s a fair representation of what I’ve been saying, that we really have nothing further to discuss.
Oh, don’t get your panties in a wad. How else would you characterize it? Advocating violence is advocating violence. The only thing that changes is who’s doing it. But, to paraphrase Shodan, it’s always different when the shoe’s on the other foot.
My “panties” are fine. 
Uhm… accurately? Innocent people never “deserve” to be killed-- I didn’t say that, and I never would. Innocent people die in every miliary conflict. That’s a sad, regretable fact, but it doesn’t mean that any given military conflict is wrong.
Sometimes violence is necessary. This is one of those times. I know you don’t like the Republicans in DC, but do you honestly think that all those Democrats in Congress would have voted for that resolution if they had reason to believe that Israel was deliberately killing civilians, and that they weren’t simply defending themselves from Hezbollah attacks? What they are doing is not unlike what we did in Afghanistan. Israel would much prefer that the Lebanese gov’t or the UN deal with Hezbollah. But that didn’t happen and it wasn’t going to happen.
It depends on whether a major power cares. They backed it up fine in Korea, and in the Congo too.