1559 or Fight

Charles Krauthammer adds his voice to the growing chorus of people who say that Israel needs to finish the job, otherwise a "ceasefire" will amount to delaying the inevitable.

Just as in Kuwait in 1991, what must follow the air campaign is a land invasion to clear the ground and expel the occupier. Israel must retake south Lebanon and expel Hezbollah. It would then declare the obvious: that it has no claim to Lebanese territory and is prepared to withdraw and hand south Lebanon over to the Lebanese army (augmented perhaps by an international force), thus finally bringing about what the world has demanded -- implementation of Resolution 1559 and restoration of south Lebanon to Lebanese sovereignty.

The resolution in question calls for Hezbollah to disband and Syria to stop fiddling with Lebanese politics. It's a yet another exercise in meaningless diplomacy that has little impact on actual events, but it makes sense on paper.

Despite the propaganda war -- the mad rush to the cameras with dead babies from both sides -- the fact remains that Hezbollah wants this war despite the wishes of the Arab League. Once the rockets run out and safe passage has been booked to Damascus for the militant leadership they'll probably start making noises about how they are willing to come to the table, but they'll do their worst to maintain a firm political stake in Lebanon.

The closest analogue is Afghanistan (remember, it's the war everybody can agree on). You've got a crackpot gang of hardcore militants that have taken advantage of a battered nation as a staging area for terrorism. Nobody wanted to harm the Afghan people, but nobody wanted to see the Taliban half-defeated either. Likewise, if Hezbollah can be uprooted and dismantled without triggering a wider war with Iran or Syria then the Israelis need to get it done.