On To The Bekaa
The fraud that is Qana continues to unravel. Michelle Malkin now has a syndicated column about it, and the truth may in fact winnow its way further into regular news coverage (via Israpundit). Some of the photographers at Qana have issued denials of the charge that they were duped (via lgf). Methinks the puppets doth protest too much.
The Hezbollah propaganda machine has also travelled to Bint Jbeil, allowing reporters to bemoan the destruction caused by Israel. Bint Jbeil was a staging area for the war against Israel, and hosted Hassan Nasrallah's victory rally after Israel's withdrawl from Lebanon six years ago, but that doesn't need to be mentioned.
The IDF has pushed into Baalbek in the Bekaa Valley. It looks like Wretchard was right. They have 10,000 troops in Lebanon now, and claim to have captured senior Hezbollah officials at a hospital.
Hezbollah was giddy at the destruction of that hospital. Really. They claimed that the attack on the hospital was a set up. To lure Israel to attack, they spread rumors that Hezbollah commanders were hiding there. This begs the question, if the whole point was to lure Israel into attacking a particular spot in Baalbek, why did Hezbollah choose the hospital? They couldn't find an empty warehouse or apartment block, something less valuable than a hospital? It's not possible that they wanted to create footage of a hospital destroyed by Israel, regardless of the loss to their own people, is it?
The Counterterrorism Blog explains the strategy behind attacking the Bekaa Valley. Riehl World View has the details of Baalbek. More updates here through the day.
UPDATE 4:52 pm CDT: Hezbollah fired 210 rockets at Israel on Wednesday, perhaps disproving the claims by various Israeli officials that Hezbollah's operational capabilites had been severely depleted. One of the rockets killed an American father of two.
The IDF blames an intelligence failure for the strike against the Qana apartment block.
The Israeli Golani brigade troops engaged in a fierce battle "...near the village of Mahabib, north of the Israeli community of Manara, and in the village of Ayta a-Shab."
UPDATE 6:08 pm CDT: The U.S., France, and Britain are working on a security council resolution that would "call for a truce and perhaps beef up U.N. peacekeepers in Lebanon until a more robust force can be formed, diplomats and U.N. officials said on Wednesday."
Kofi Annan took a break from counting his money to criticize a weak security council statement on Qana.
UPDATE 8:24 pm CDT: An Israel soldier was killed in the fighting near Ayta a-Shab. Israeli generals are talking baout regaining the security zone they held in southern Lebanon until 2000.
An Islamic Jihad terrorist was killed by an Israeli air strike. Jets fired into a group of "gunmen" near the town of Dahiniye in the Gaza Strip. The IDF is carrying out a major operatin in Gaza. According to Palestinian witnesses, they've sent about 50 tanks into Gaza near Rafiah in support of an engineering brigade.
The war in Lebanon may not topple any government in the Middle East, yet may send Tony Blair into private life.
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