Politics: Stop the war in Lebanon and Palestina

[Photo: Guardian - A volunteer searches the rubble of residential buildings hit by an Israeli air strike on the southern Lebanese city of Tyre. Photograph: Hassan Ammar/AFP/Getty Images]

Since Israel started its offensive against Lebanon one week ago, after the kidnapping of two soldiers by the Hizbullah (or Hezbollah), more than 200 people, in its majority civilian, have been killed - [Guardian]. The Israeli army continues bombing southern Lebanon and the southern suburbs of Beirut by sea and air, in special the shiite district of Dahia, where the headquarters of the Hezbollah are supposed to be located.

The death toll among Lebanese civilians and soldiers continues to rise. Today agencies in Beirut reported that Israeli airstrikes had killed 13 civilians and 11 soldiers of the Lebanese army (who are not in conflict with Israel!). The dead included a family of whose home was hit by an Israeli missile. Israel has ignored Lebanese calls for a ceasefire and has said it will not relent until the Hezbollah gives up the two soldiers it captured during a raid last week and moves away from the Israeli border. Now this does not seem to me to be a serious argument, to start a war, but apparently it is, for many western leaders, for whom it is the Hezbollah fighters who have poured "petrol on the bonfire" by kidnapping Israeli soldiers and firing rockets into Israel.

Apparently, opinion polls in Israel suggest the vast majority of Israelis approve of the government's actions in Lebanon, which is a big support for the army, who is already mobilising reservists. All those who dare speak against the war and the way the crisis is conducted are simply ignored and seen as traitors. And in the meantime Hezbollah's rockets have killed many innocent civilian in Israel. It is a never ending spiral of violence.

Now western European leaders and the UN Secretary General Kofi Annan have called for urgent action from the international community to stop the violence between Israel and Lebanon. They call for a new international force to be deployed in the border region. President Bush himself has talked about the role of Syria - in an unguarded moment at the G8 summit - when he spoke to UK Prime Minister Tony Blair without knowing that microphones were live. He said: "What they [referring probably to the UN] need to do is to get Syria to get Hezbollah to stop doing this shit and it's over." Bush also said that he was sending his Secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice, to the region "pretty soon", and that is already a sign of the urgency the US sees in solving the present crisis. In fact nothing is likely to happen for many days. The US will not take any step and will probably give Israel a "window" in which to carry on with its campaign and achieve its targets. Too early for a "ceasefire".

Even if unlikely, this could turn into a regional war, involving Syria and who knows Iran. These could even profit of the involvement of the US in other fronts - Afghanistan and Iraq - already, to step in and destabilise even further the Middle East. But it seems that neither the US nor the Israeli have thought of that. Or have they? Read more in the following "post".

To my understanding Europe should take a strong position against the Israel campaign and clearly not align itself with the US approach. Europe should decide on an economic embargo against Israel, boycott its exports to Europe and Europe's exports to Israel. This could contribute to isolate Israel (unlikely, with the US) and have lithe impact for the moment, but could have its medium-term results. The economic language may be the only they listen to, in order to sit at a table and try to settle for peace in the region.

Read futher in the Guardian and BBC news.