Now, I know what you’re thinking: this was buried deeeeep inside the article. Nope. This was actually the first sentence of a wire piece entitled “Arabs Press Syria to End Hezbollah Support.”
Shocking? Certainly. However, the best was yet to come:
Israel faced tougher-than-expected ground battles and bombarded targets in southern Lebanon, hitting a convoy of refugees.
Israel's defense minister said his country would accept an international force, preferably NATO, on its border after it drives back or weakens Hezbollah. But his troops described the militants they encountered as a smart, well-organized and ruthless guerrilla force whose fighters do not seem afraid to die.
A “well-organized and ruthless guerrilla force?” Aren’t these all innocent civilians that did nothing to warrant this brutal attack?
Clearly, this coverage was tough to believe given the media’s penchant since this started to focus almost exclusively on Lebanese casualties while depicting Israel as the aggressor in this incursion. Yet, the surprises kept coming: “In the 12th day of fighting, guerrillas launched more than a dozen rockets at the Israeli city of Haifa, killing two people.”
Wait a minute. People are actually dying in Israel? Isn’t this a “disproportionate response” wherein only innocent Lebanese are actually being killed? But this still wasn’t the most surprising aspect of this report:
With Israel and the United States saying a real cease-fire is not possible until Hezbollah is reined in, Arab heavyweights Egypt and Saudi Arabia were pushing Syria to end its support for the guerrillas, Arab diplomats in Cairo said.
A loss of Syria's support would deeply weaken Hezbollah, though its other ally, Iran, gives it a large part of its money and weapons. The two moderate Arab governments were prepared to spend heavily from Egypt's political capital in the region and Saudi Arabia's vast financial reserves to break Damascus from the guerrillas and Iran, the diplomats said.
Sadly, this was only a wire report, and the rest of the media is under absolutely no obligation to disseminate this information to the public. As such, it remains to be seen how much of this article – if anything – will show up in the mainstream news the next 24 hours.
