I've been trying to work out exactly what's going on in Lebanon. I really feel like we're still in the dark on this one. There are a lot of people who say that Israel has 'reacted disproportionately' to the abduction of its soldiers. I guess that would be true if Israel was solely reacting to this one action by Hezbollah. My sense is that this was more like the straw that broke the camel's back.
I pretty much missed the first week of everything that was happening - vacation etc. - but I find it hard to believe that Israel's only going to bomb Hezbollah targets for a week and leave it at that. They must be planning to invade - even if only to round up as many Hezbollah members and their weapons as can be found. Why else would they be trying to cut off the Hezbollah-controlled south from Syria and the rest of Lebanon? It makes no sense to bomb them for a week, but allow Hezbollah to remain in place.
Also, Hezbollah is Iran's ally (at least - probably more like a branch of the Iranian military) and Iran's President has not been shy about his desire to see Israel wiped off the map. That's pretty provocative in my book and no action could be disproportionate when a nation is facing a powerful enemy that wants to wipe it off the map.
Therefore, I reject the notion that Israel has acted 'disproportionately'. Whether it has acted wisely is, however, another question. We won't know that answer for a while.
