Based on the general impression I was given of Olmert and Perez, I was surprised they have prosecuted this war with such resolve. But, ironically, Bush is encouraging the kind of war that Sharon would have fought, and Olmert is offering the kind of war that Clinton would have approved of.
Robert Avrech is seething about the decision to pull back on a ground campaign.Yoni told Hugh Hewitt that there was a Security Cabinet Meeting in Israel. During that meeting, a ground invasion was discussed and there was some apprehension about such an invasion. IDF Chief of Staff Dan Chalutz said something about like, "We don't need to kill all of Hizbullah, that they can change." . . . .Robert follows with a grim assessment of Israel's leadership which reinforces the uneasy feelings I had after Olmert assumed power.Yoni, in disgust remarked that he wants a warrior not a social worker for the campaign.
Out of Step Jew is equally grim on the shift in Arab opinion, which he attributes to Olmert and Chalutz' hesitation:
. . . . victory in war, especially against a guerilla army is as much determined by perception as by the battle field results. One army's victory is not necessarily another's defeat. And sometimes victory is humiliation. Any sense of hesitation is taken as weakness and the Israeli delay in land operations since bloody Wednesday (and another Golani attack has been pushed off at least three days according to Golani troops) has been taken as a defeat in spite of the Chief of Staff's claim to have seriously weakened Hezbollah leadership and military capacity.Rev. Sensing says:General Halutz, in his news conference yesterday, changed the "We will Win" boast of the Prime Minister in front of the Knesset last week to, essentially, "we will not lose". Whereas the original promise was to stop the rocket attacks on the north and to destroy the military capacity of Hezbollah, now the mission is to weaken their military capacity and to minimize rocket attacks.
. . . . When Israel was handing it to the Hezbollah, the Arab world was against them. When they saw that Israel was not in this to win – that it would not send the proper number of troops into battle and not make the economic sacrifices that a wider reserve call up would entail – the tide turned. . . .
The question still dangling before us is whether the decidedly non-martial Olmert government will commit all the military resources required to destroy Hezbollah quickly, on the ground, for Hezbollah will not be defeated from the air. If the callup of 30,000 reservists is a prelude to such commitment, then there is hope yet. But if we see the reserve troops or units being used to relieve, rather than reinforce the regulars, then we’ll know that Olmert and company have effectively surrendered.It doesn't look good.