Too much at stake for Israel to accept diplomacy now

Caroline Glick, the Cassandra of Israel, encapsulates what is at stake for Israel right now:

As the stakes of the war against Israel rise by the day, we find the international community, led by the US, and willingly followed by the Olmert government, scope-locked on a diplomatic agenda that is irrelevant to the imminent dangers Israel and the world now face in the midst of this Iranian sponsored jihad.

Indeed, it is worse than irrelevant. It is counterproductive.

For if the aims of the ongoing diplomatic blitzkrieg are all met, Israel will find itself denied its right to self-defense; with its legal right to secure and recognized borders in tatters; and with Hizbullah sitting pretty behind a protective shield of the Lebanese military and an international force that will not attack it.

Glick also attacks Secretary of State Rice's own denials of reality. The Monk agrees: Secretary Rice has essentially behaved like a latter day Warren Christopher in the past week and her public pronouncements have been disgraceful. The President has been more measured and more pro-Israel. Secretary Rice seems to have sipped from the Arabist waters that flow through Foggy Bottom's drinking fountains. Glick's retort to Secretary Rice's suggestion of a "multinational force" identifies the flaw in the proposal:

US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and her colleagues claim that the proposed multinational force would protect Israel. Yet it is already clear that this will not be the case. As things now stand, the proposed force will be led by France. Indonesia and Turkey have reportedly offered to participate. With France leading the international community in condemning Israel for defending itself; with some 40 percent of Indonesians telling pollsters that they wish to participate in jihad; and with Turkey led by an Islamist government, can anyone believe that this force will neutralize Hizbullah? None of these countries even accept that Hizbullah is a terrorist organization.

OBVIOUSLY this force will not fight Hizbullah. But it will prevent Israel from attacking Hizbullah. And given that the force is to be mandated under a Chapter VII UN resolution, were Israel to take independent measures to defend itself, it would immediately become an outlaw state open to arms embargoes and other sanctions.

Moreover, the planned multinational force is supposed to facilitate the Lebanese army's deployment along the Lebanese border with Israel. This is supposed to be a good thing. Yet, since the outbreak of the war, the Lebanese army has been actively fighting with Hizbullah. Its radars have been used to lock in Israeli targets for Hizbullah missile crews. It is paying pensions to the families of fallen Hizbullah fighters. On Sunday its soldiers reportedly shot at IDF helicopters in the Bekaa Valley. . .

The US's willful blindness, Secretary Rice's newfound stability fetish, and Ehud Olmert's personal weakness, are making Israel LESS safe than when it first (rightfully) attacked Hizb'Allah for bombing Israeli cities and kidnapping Israeli soldiers. Thus, the observation by Bret Stephens that Israel is currently LOSING this war is trenchant.