SP almost all Lebanese people stayed in Lebanon and some Australian Lebanese continued their holiday regardless of the mess.

So what? Most Iraqis have stayed, most Afghans, most Sudanese. Again so what?

In interviews with Liam Bartlett on 60 minutes tonight there were a number of Australian citizens fighting with Israel. One young woman claimed that as a fighter pilot the Israeli army would never kill civilians which makes it hard to explain 1300 dead civilians doesn't it. I wonder if she thinks they died of fright or something.

Bartlett was on the scene when the last bombs rained down on south Beirut and Fisk later reported dozens of dead people pulled from the rubble. Guess no one killed them.

SP, you are being malicious and ridiculous and seem to have become divorced from the reality on the ground which everyone in Lebanon says is a catastrophic mess.

Of course the christian and sunni areas of Beirut are not touched but the shi'ite areas have been blown into rubble. Madness when they are 40% of the population.

Yabby
The "Arab world" tends to only get concerned about such things when their side gets the short end of the stick.They will do/say little about Sudan since their side is ethnically cleansing the others.

And as you can see from some of the responses on this thread, it satisfies a deep psychological deficiency in some that they only see & criticize the injustices committed by Israel & ignore those of the rest of the world.

Alchmemist, though its a bit harsh, still like your reasoning, because it's so much like that of Socrates, who quoted that famous phrase "... out with Gods and in with the Good." Could say, however, though a lover of Greek philosophy, still like to call myself a liberal Anglican and determined to stay that way.

Please don't change mate, and keep up those commonsenical comments.

Cheers, George C - WA.

Response to Yabby:

>Quite amazing that you think that our pollies or the US should
>be the world's policemen and problem solvers.

It was not I who gave the US, France, UK, China and Russia, veto power on the UN Security Council. You'll find it is not I, who calls the US President, the "leader of the free world". The US has with open eyes adopted its own foreign policy, maintained its military strength, alliances and it's nuclear options and forward positions.

It is everyone's interest that the West solve problems. The West has the military, economic and diplomatic power to make a difference. Western institutions are being replicated in almost every nation and its Western interrelations that are driving the development of international law.

Since you have used the police analogy - think of how actual policing is done in Australia domestically. We give police weapons and guns. The laws are established democratically. Independent courts provide the sanctions and penalties.

There are only elements of this at the international level, in the relations between countries. Somehow the logic which applies within a modern nation is not strictly applied between nations. A rich American submits to the law, knowing its a better outcome than arranging for their own protection or seeking special privileges. Yet the United States cannot bring itself to support the International Criminal Court.

Now, that is something amazing.

>Considering that its Arabs who are doing the killing, what
>say the Arab world gets off its proverbial arse and does
>something to stop their brothers doing al the slaughtering?

Is this one of these hokey "us vs them" perspectives, which ignore both current reality and history? What have Arab nations ever done in concert to be considered a united force?

David Latimer,

As I understand it, the whole concept of law in Australia is that in 1901 the people adopted a Constitution transferring certain powers to the new Commonwealth Government, and retaining the rest with the States. There was no power for any of these governments, particularly the federal, to delegate any of its powers to foreigners.

The United Nations did not exist in 1901. When it was created there was no move for the people to transfer any powers to the United Nations, and consequently they have none. All so called international law only has force in Australia to the extent that federal law has validated it. The commonwealth has full power to abrogate any treaty that has been entered into, if necessary by referendum, despite the fact that it entered into a convention that it would not do so. (That convention would have to be the first one to be abrogated). Consequently international law is a bit of a joke, as it only applies when nations choose to let it.

This situation is completely democratic. If anyone thinks that the people of Australia would ever give control of their affairs to anyone in the UN, they are operating in a different galaxy. You only have to look at the UN peacekeeping forces, who only have national allegiances, to see what happens when you need an international allegiance, which does not exist. Consequently the UN troops are notorious for their reluctance to fight. The UN has no army, no compulsory court, no power to enforce its dictates independent of its constituent nation states, and this will not change.

With the enormous disparity in wealth and power between the first and third world there will be no international transfer of power in the forseeable future. We will just have wars.

As someone who is firmly in the old Whig tradition that government is the problem, not the solution, and that one of today's main problems is that governments are seeking to interfere more and more in dailty life, I would support the current postion.

"The West has the military, economic and diplomatic power to make a difference."

Ha David, you would have to be kidding! America has yet to wake
up to the fact that being able to drop lots of bombs will solve
anything. Lets look at history! 40 years of sanctions against
Castro achieved nothing. They lost against those "primitive"
Vietnamese. Sanctions against Iraq were a dismal failure.
How long did they last in Somalia? etc. etc. Life is more
complex then that.

For a start, your policeman argument totally forgets a thing
called people skills. The West, in particular the US, is
much hated in the world, exactly because they try to be a
policeman.

Now why should a bunch of crazy honchos in Khartoum take
any notice? Well they don't, as the evidence shows, especially
when its White, Christian Westerners, tryng to boss them
around.

OTOH no nation is an island. Sudan, run by Arabs, has
extensive relations with other Arab-Islamic nations. They
will take more notice of what their "brothers" think, then
what George and Co think. It would not be beyond the Arab
league to point out to Sudan, that if the Arab world wants
to loudly complain about 1000 deaths in Lebanon, it is not
illogical of the West to point out that Arab nations are saying
little about the huge genocide being committed by their Arab
brothers in Sudan. Send US troops to Sudan, people will shoot
them just for being Americans. Send other Arab troops and
they will have to think twice. People skills matter in
politics, sadly George and Co havent noticed that yet.