A new name for the Israeli-Lebanese war?

Javier Solana, whose official title is High Representative for the Common Foreign and Security Policy of the European Union - effectively the EU foreign minister - is one of my favorite politicians in the world today.

He was Secretary-General of NATO back during the Kosovo War. Like a number of my all-time favorite quotes, I wish I'd kept a copy of the original of this. But some reporter asked him about his past, when as a Spanish Social Democrat he had once demonstrated in the streets against Spain even joining NATO. The reporter asked him if it felt strange now to be the political head of NATO while NATO was making war in Kosovo.

His response, which I have to quote from memory, was a classic: "Only idiots never change their minds".

Solana has now come up with what may wind up being the name in the history books for the current Israeli-Palestinian-Lebanese-Hizbollah and who-knows-who-else-to-come war. He calls it a "guerra sin lógica", a "war without logic". (Solana califica de 'guerra sin lógica' el conflicto entre el Líbano e Israel El Mundo/EFE 16.07.06)

Okay, so it probably won't fit as a name in the history books. It would be hard to distinguish it from so many others with a name like that.

But it's a pretty good description what we're seeing so far.

Solana has been in Lebanon meeting with Prime Minister Fuad Siniora, whose government Bush supposedly thought was a wonderful model of freedom but which the Bush-Cheney administration is pretty much leaving in the lurch, as everyone in the world can see. Solana called for the release of the two captured Israeli soldiers, which is nominally Israel's justification for the war. He also called for enforcement of UN Resolution 1559, which includes the disarming of Hizbollah. El Mundo reports:

Asimismo, dijo que quería mostrar su solidaridad con el Líbano y que todo el mundo está trabajando para encontrar una solución a este "problema catastrófico".

[At the same time [Solana] said that he wanted to demonstrate his solidarity with Lebanon and that the whole world is working to find a solution to this "catastrophic problem".]

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