[UPDATED]

Laura Rozen points to a Ha’aretz story that Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni indicates a willingness to accept a UN peacekeeping force in Lebanon:

peaking after a meeting with a United Nations delegation headed by special envoy Vijay Nambiar, Livni said that while Israel would prefer the deployment of the Lebanese army in the south of the country, “we will consider other solutions put forward.”

“If there is a need to strengthen the Lebanese army somehow, so that the military in south Lebanon is effective, and prevents Hezbollah from returning, we will consider ways to do achieve this,” Livni said.

She stressed, however, that any solution would have to take into consideration Israel’s ability to respond to any incidents in the future

Live From an Israeli Bunker issues this report:

The air force was told to crank it up because the operation time left is not very long. So they need to make it count. Here in Haifa we had three (count them) siren warnings within short pauses of each other, at least six rockets hit my area. The north is being heavily bombarded right now with Carmiel, Tverias, zpat, Malot, and Roch Pina. One dead in Nahariya. This all happened in about 20 minutes.

Kind of clashes with the title of this post, doesn’t it? Well not necessarily. Nasrallah is firing wildly now, with no accuracy, he’s shooting whenever and where ever he can. He wants an unconditional ceasefire and in his eyes this is what will get him that. Fat chance.

There is talk of quick infantry missions, the object is not to stay there long but get things done. This is going to go on for a week or two more at least, personally I’m safe, thanks for your concern.

If true, this coheres well with the possibility that the Israelis intend to degrade Hezbollah as much as possible, but might now recognize that an international presence will be essential to preventing an absolute power vacuum and collapse in Lebanon.

A great many bloggers are aflutter about George Will’s attack on The Weekly Standard. I can’t, however, endorse John Podhoretz’s odd claim that it “may prove to the be the most discussed op-ed of the year.”

The death toll from sectarian violence in Iraq over the last few days seems to exceed that in Lebanon. As does that of the Tsunami in Indonesia.

An Unsealed Room provides links to some very high-traffic Lebanese and Israel bogs, blog aggregators, regional blogs, and message boards that provide personal perspectives on the conflict.

Austin Bay repeats the standard, but incorrect, canards about the Peace of Westphalia. He seems, moreover, a bit confused about the relevant treaties; he refers to “the Treaty of Westphalia (1648) and the series of peace settlements that ended the Thirty Years War in Europe,” but I think he means Osnabrück and Münster which were constituent treaties of Westphalia rather than the 1659 Peace of the Pyrenees that ended the related Franco-Spanish conflict. We’ll probably never know, since my comments on his blog continue to get censored.

We’re apparently important enough to be targeted by CENTCOM public relations. I, for one, welcome this development. But I do think it is interesting that blogs are now part of the ‘war information’ effort.

Filed as: Lebanon and Iraq