UN deployment...another mantra without substance.

Meanwhile Andrew Sullivan has this to say..

(WARNING: It's not all peace & love or non-judgemental)

It's been such a wonderful Easter weekend I found it hard to sit down and think, let alone, write about the Middle East. I guess two points strike me: I was really cheered by president Bush's statement about Israel's need for self-defense, and about Yassir Arafat's fundamental responsibility for each day's unfolding horrors. I was rattled recently by what seemed like equivocation emerging from the White House. I should have trusted the president more. Secondly, this is indeed a war, as prime minister Sharon has said. Yassir Arafat is part of a nexus of terror that has links to Baghdad, is armed by the Iranian dictators, fomented by the Syrians, and financed by the Saudis. Tom Friedman is absolutely right that if the strategy of suicide bombing is allowed to work in Israel, it is only a matter of time before it is deployed in America. And, as Friedman notes, it is not some ad hoc strategy concocted by the Palestinians. It is a conscious, premeditated war-plan devised and supported by almost every Arab state. Yesterday, a Palestinian spokesman made the following statement:
"Our heroes will penetrate your streets, your cities. You will not enjoy security and peace unless our people enjoy peace and freedom... This aggression is by an American decision, and American weapons. America now is the one providing cover for terrorism and supporting terrorism."
Ignore the Orwellian newspeak. What matters is that these deranged Islamist murderers see Israel as target practise. This war in Israel is not some minor conflict related geographically to the war against terror. It is the same war. Its solution cannot be negotiated. It has to be won. Israel must now fight for survival, by rooting out the terrorist networks threatening the sole democracy in the Middle East, unilaterally retreating to more compact and defensible borders, constructing a wall that will more effectively keep Islamist terrorists out, and beginning a policy of deportations of any and all Israeli Arabs connected to terrorist groups. There is no other way. There is no-one but fanatics and murderers to negotiate with. You've got to kiss the settlements goodbye, wage a far more aggressive war against the Palestinian terrorists, and then consolidate defensible territory. We can and should hope for peace. But the only way to get there is through the thorough prosecution of this war. As Sharon tells Safire today: "All countries seeking peace should pray that the Israeli Defense Forces succeed in their mission, because only by uprooting and eradicating terror will we achieve a durable peace." He's right. Let us pray.

-p (as with 911, if it's them or us, I'm for making it them)