Speaking of war crimes... U.N. Says It Protested to Israel for 6 Hours During Attack That Killed 4 Observers in Lebanon (nytimes.com, 7/27/06):

Jane Holl Lute, the assistant secretary general for peacekeeping operations, said at an emergency meeting of the Security Council that over the six-hour period in which the United Nations' warnings were being conveyed to the Israelis, the observation post at Khiam, in southern Lebanon, continued to come under fire.

The firings persisted even after rescuers reached the hilltop site, she said, and in all it was subjected to 21 strikes, 11 of them aerial bombardments and at least 6 artillery rounds.

She described the observation post as "well known and clearly marked" and added that no Hezbollah activity was reported in the area.

The four dead observers were from China, Finland, Canada and Austria.

An eerie resemblance to certain events that occurred in Vietnam. Sergeant Tells of Plot to Kill Iraqi Detainees (nytimes.com, 7/28/06):

Just before leaving, the soldiers had been given an order to "kill all military-age men" at the site by a colonel and a captain, said Paul Bergrin and Michael Waddington, the lawyers who are disputing Sergeant Lemus' account. Military officials in Baghdad have declined to comment on whether such an order, which would have been a violation of the law of war, might have been given.

What I hope the men do not know is how it turned out in one of the Vietnam versions of this story: there was a lot of fuss, and a lot of media (and the loss of 'hearts and minds' everywhere), and then everyone involved basically got off and went back to their normal lives.

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I've had some complex discussions with my partner about the concept of the 'law of war.' To him, war is fundamentally immoral, and so it is preposterous to provide rules and laws that make war acceptable to anyone.

I do believe in war laws and war crimes. I believe that, if a home country of mine was attacked, that I should be able to have a right to self defense in similar form to the form of the original attack; that the defense should play by certain rules (no raping, pillaging, theft, slaughter of innocents, despoiling of land, etc.) - that a certain level of lawful order should continue to exist, and that everyone who violates that order should be held accountable in the aftermath along with whoever started the attack.

Unfortunately, this is an ideal: superpowers (worldwide and dominant regional powers) only abide by the rules they wish, take what they want, execute dissenters, and then hold themselves above the law. My partner's point about how preposterous the entire idea of war laws are is valid in the world now, where the victor in a war generally gets to choose against whom laws will and won't be retroactively applied. Winners do not currently pay for war crimes. And we live in a country which holds itself above the law consistently, yet uses the same laws to justify invading others who do not comply, as if the laws only exist when applied against our real or imagined enemies.

For this reason, we really need international legal bodies with the authority to hold all nations into account. My country believed in such bodies when it was small and vulnerable, but now that it's strong, it prefers to dominate by force. When it becomes weaker, as other world powers grow, I imagine there will be another change of position on the issue. But such international authority is currently needed.

Tide of Arab Opinion Turns to Support for Hezbollah (nytimes.com, 7/28/06) suggests that Arab governments which previously criticized Hezbollah's actions against Israel are now being forced to jump onto a bandwagon of support that is being pulled by popular opinion. With images of destruction in Lebanon on television nightly, Hezbollah's fight against a government that is devastating innocent civilians looks more respectable to many.

I'm sure this is a consequence that Israel did not intend.

418% Overhead in Iraq. Audit Finds U.S. Hid Cost of Iraq Projects (nytimes.com, subscription required, 7/30/2006): The NY Times' first paragraph:

The State Department agency in charge of $1.4 billion in reconstruction money in Iraq used an accounting shell game to hide ballooning cost overruns on its projects there and knowingly withheld information on schedule delays from Congress, a federal audit released late Friday has found.

The article goes on to describe examples in the audit where figures were fabricated to make projects appear to stay on budget, and situations where significant delays weren't reported.

Awkward, awkward timing. Israel 'presses US on bomb sale' (news.bbc.co.uk, 7/23/06):

Reports from the US suggest Washington has been asked to speed up a shipment of precision bombs sold as part of a deal with Israel last year.

According to a report in the New York Times, Israel made the request after it began its air assault on Hezbollah targets in Lebanon 12 days ago. . . .

Israel is one of the largest customers for US armaments.

It also receives several billion dollars a year in direct and indirect aid from Washington.

Heartbreaking to see. I live in a city, and there are certain things about living in a densely populated area that have a familiar, home-like feeling. People who don't like cities may not understand, but seeing images of cities devastated is painful. This isn't just a city: it's a city like the one I live in.

(Photo popup link) BBC News | In pictures | Beirut destruction | A city in ruins (news.bbc.co.uk).

BBC NEWS | Middle East | UN appalled by Beirut devastation (news.bbc.co.uk, 7/23/06).

The UN's Jan Egeland has condemned the devastation caused by Israeli air strikes in Beirut, saying it is a violation of humanitarian law.

Mr Egeland, the UN's emergency relief chief, described the destruction as "horrific" as he toured the city.