I was stunned by Condi's statement, found in
Timesonline:
"[W]e seek an end to the root cause of the violence so that an enduring peace can be established. But if we look for a ceasefire that simply freezes the status quo ante, then we will be back here again in another six months, or nine months, or a year, looking for another ceasefire as Hezbollah uses southern Lebanon as a base to launch rockets against Israel."
I probably don't need to point out that Hezbollah wasn't launching rockets against Israel until Israel started bombing them first. However, that being said, Condi needs to look in her dictionary. A "ceasefire" isn't a peace treaty. It's a temporary cessation of warfare until a permanent peace can be negotiated. What she's saying is she wants to let them keep killing each other while we work to get what we want in the Middle East. Other countries, as usual, don't agree. France has called for a "humanitarian truce" to "alleviate the suffering of civilians as soon as possible" and has "proposed that the Security Council call for a ceasefire, while addressing the underlying causes of the conflict. Russia, Greece, Congo, Peru and Qatar, the sole Arab representative on the Security Council, have all also endorsed the need for an immediate cessation of hostilities." Not Condi. Not the U.S.