[lit-ideas] Re: Mideast: Ripples of War

I heard an interview with Tom Ricks who wrote the book called Fiasco, The 
American Military Adventure in Iraq.  His worst case scenario is that a 
pan-Arabic leader like Saladin might emerge to unite the messes that the U.S. 
and its joined at the hip ally Israel created.  That's worst case scenario, 
Stan, but most likely higher than the 1% probabilities that we're defending 
ourselves from in this War on Terror.  Sleep tight, Stan.


----- Original Message ----- 
From: Stan Spiegel 
To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx;Bonnie Spiegel;David Cowen;Margaret Spiegel
Sent: 7/31/2006 11:48:39 PM 
Subject: [lit-ideas] Mideast: Ripples of War


Christopher Dickey and Rod Nordland's article in this week's Newsweek is a 
frightening assessment of what's happening in the Middle East. Frightening for 
Israel especially. I usually sleep like a log. Now I'm not sleeping very well. 
- S.S. 
Take a look at this:

"No one denies that Hizbullah started the fight, with its unprovoked incursion 
into Israel, and no one doubts that Israel can win it, at least in conventional 
terms. But that's not what matters as much as public perceptions, and the 
impact those perceptions have from Tehran to Cairo. The conflagrations in Gaza, 
Lebanon and Iraq risk converging, if not on the ground, then in that virtual 
reality?on satellite television and the Web?where Al Qaeda and Hizbullah find 
recruits for their global networks. Israel can bomb Lebanon's infrastructure 
all it wants, but Hizbullah, which operates beyond the limits of a state, 
ultimately has no infrastructure. Hizbullah's own rockets and missiles can miss 
nearly all their targets, with comparatively little loss of life, but so long 
as they keep firing, they shatter the myth of Israeli invincibility and win 
friends and admirers in a radicalized Muslim world. "The Zionist enemy has not 
been able to reach a military victory," said Hizbullah lea
 der Hassan Nasrallah in a speech Friday on his organization's Al-Manar TV, 
still broadcasting despite Israeli Air Force strikes that obliterated its 
studios and transmission towers. "I'm not saying that. They said that. The 
whole world is saying that."  
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