Cease-fire on verge of collapse

The Monty Python Prize for Arab politics must go to Emile Lahoud, the well-known Syrian puppet who also happens to be Lebanon's president. Hizbullah, he explains, "is part of the Lebanese army." Rather than disarm Hizbullah, he is saying, Lebanon's army should fight alongside of it. Israel, by his account, should turn over southern Lebanon to the joint Lebanese army-Hizbullah forces.

Aside from invalidating the cease-fire, what Lahoud has done is to justify completely Israel's war effort. For if Hizbullah is part of Lebanon's army (it is already a member of the coalition government), then the attack on Israel was an act of war by Lebanon, which was completely responsible for everything that happened next.

If this is true, why should the international community rush reconstruction aid to the aggressor? And how can a cease-fire depend on a government which views itself not as Hizbullah's master but as its ally?

We may very well be on the verge of an amazing turnaround regarding the cease-fire in Lebanon organized by the UN Security Council.