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Last week I decided to do a quick blog entry about Woody Allen’s 2005 movie Match Point. I shouldn’t have but I did. It wasn’t particularly favourable, and now, especially as I’ve been told off about it, I guess I was unfair about the film itself. I am now willing to admit that it was better than I originally said it was. Part of the reason for my disfavour comes from a lack of enthusiasm about watching it in the first place. At the time, however, I had no particular idea why this was. I’ve always been a big Woody Allen fan but I simply haven’t been paying attention to his most recent movies and although the publicity for MP on this side of the water was significant, I wasn’t sure before watching it if it was a return to form or a bit of a dud.

Part of my lack of interest could be due to a perception, widely held that Woody’s movies since the late 1990’s have been becoming less interesting to watch. In Barabara Kopple’s 1998 documentary, Wild Man Blues, we see Woody floating down a Venetian canal in a Gondola with the ‘notorious’ Soon-Yi Previn by his side. Suddenly, from the canal bank an American tourist spots the couple and is thrown into a paroxysm of star-stuckitus. The tourist’s desperate attempt to get Allen’s attention is met with a cheerful wave and smile, which is a basic requirement of how Hollywood royalty should behave when they come into contact with the awestruck commonality. But through gritted teeth we can hear Woody saying: ‘Oh, you want to know me now, but you wouldn’t spend five bucks going to see any of my movies in the theatre’.

But the slump in his fortunes wasn’t necessarily because the later films were bad. After all, one his best is Sweet and Lowdown (1999), which has Sean Penn doing a brilliant turn as a gifted Jazz guitarist with a disreputable home life. Like Match Point, it wasn’t a comedy and didn’t feature Woody as the eponymous hero. But other recent films such as Anything Else (2003) and Hollywood Ending (2003) disappeared almost as soon as they were released.

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The ramifications of Reid’s statements are frightening.

On the one hand, you’ll have the embattled political establishment redefining what constitutes legal and moral orthodoxy for reasons of national expediency, seemingly allowing the government to do what it wants.

On the other, you’ll have deluded liberals in the chattering classes wringing their hands while concocting ever more complicated appeasement arguments, seemingly condoning the activities of anti-Western malcontents.

If you were a jihadist, you’d be delighted by this kind of polarization, a perfect recipe for chronic instability.

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The Israeli Defence establishment has been given approval by the security cabinet to expand its ground operation, but has been told to delay it while diplomatic efforts continue in New York, the Israeli newspaper Haaretz reports. However, the heads of the defense forces claim that the operation will take a month or maybe two before the objective to ‘"significantly reduce" Hezbollah rocket fire into Israel, destroy Hezbollah's infrastructure in south Lebanon and kill as many Hezbollah operatives as possible’ can be achieved.

It seems strange to announce these plans considering the concerted effort in New York to find some sort of peace agreement in the next week or so (although Reuter’s Alert Net reports that France and the US are still split on a resolution). Despite the delay it seems incredible that Israel could be allowed to continue this level of bombardment for a further two months.

Dick O’Brien of Back Seat Drivers points us to a piece by Robert Fisk that asks ‘How does your Beirut home get blown up’. It seems all it takes is a fool with a rifle to start firing impotently at a passing drone outside your apartment building to bring rockets down on your head. It was reported that 17 civilians were killed as a result.

There has been much moral indignation about how this war has been conducted by the Israelis, and the mounting civilian death toll adds to the sense that Israeli original reason for the offensive – that it was a reaction to a border incursion and the kidnapping of its soilders – seems less justifiable than ever. This week George Monbiot, reacting to the question ‘what would you have done, if attacked’ which is often thrown back on peaceniks like him – argues that the Israeli attack was not a reaction at all, but was premeditated.

Monbiot points to a number of similar incursions that occurred between 2000 and 2006, including incidents where Hizbollah rockets were fired, Israeli soilders kidnapped and leaders of Islamic Jihad assassinated and says that none of them resulted in the escalation of hosilities.

But the main crux of his argument rests on a series of articles that suggest the plans for an Israeli attack on Hizbollah in the South of Lebanon were already well advanced before the events of July 12th.

Monbiot refers to Matthew Kalman’s 21st of July report in the San Francisco Chronicle. In that article Kalman quotes Gerald Steinberg, professor of political science at Bar-Ilan University as saying:

"Of all of Israel's wars since 1948, this was the one for which Israel was most prepared. In a sense, the preparation began in May 2000, immediately after the Israeli withdrawal, when it became clear the international community was not going to prevent Hezbollah from stockpiling missiles and attacking Israel. By 2004, the military campaign scheduled to last about three weeks that we're seeing now had already been blocked out and, in the last year or two, it's been simulated and rehearsed across the board."

And he reveals the extent of the planning:
“More than a year ago, a senior Israeli army officer began giving PowerPoint presentations, on an off-the-record basis, to U.S. and other diplomats, journalists and think tanks, setting out the plan for the current operation in revealing detail. Under the ground rules of the briefings, the officer could not be identified.

In his talks, the officer described a three-week campaign: The first week concentrated on destroying Hezbollah's heavier long-range missiles, bombing its command-and-control centers, and disrupting transportation and communication arteries. In the second week, the focus shifted to attacks on individual sites of rocket launchers or weapons stores. In the third week, ground forces in large numbers would be introduced, but only in order to knock out targets discovered during reconnaissance missions as the campaign unfolded. There was no plan, according to this scenario, to reoccupy southern Lebanon on a long-term basis.”

But in the same article Kalman highlights the argument that the IDF are just doing their jobs, considering the fact that Hizbollah and Syria were not exactly hiding the build up of Iranian weapons that Hizbollah had amassed:

“Israel didn't need sophisticated intelligence to discover the huge buildup of Iranian weapons supplies to Hezbollah by way of Syria, because Hezbollah's patrons boasted about it openly in the pages of the Arabic press. As recently as June 16, less than four weeks before the Hezbollah border raid that sparked the current crisis, the Syrian defense minister publicly announced the extension of existing agreements allowing the passage of trucks shipping Iranian weapons into Lebanon.”

However, another plank of Monbiot’s argument is provided by Tanya Reinhart, Professor Emeritus of Linguistics and Media Studies at Tel Aviv University. In her article, Israel’s ‘new Middle East’ she argues that:
“When the Israeli army left southern Lebanon in 2000, the plans to return were ready. But, in Israel's military vision, in the next round, the land should be first "cleaned" of its residents, as Israel did when it occupied the Syrian Golan Heights in 1967, and as it is doing now in southern Lebanon.”

According to her, this fits with Ben Gurion vision, that Israel’s border should be ‘natural’, ‘that is, the Jordan River in the East, and the Litani River of Lebanon in the north’.

Israeli Government ministers insist that they don’t have designs on Lebanon and that they are eager to retreat as soon as possible, as long as the long term threat of Hizbollah is removed. However, considering the meshing of Hizbollah into the social fabric of the south the only way to ensure this is either a permanent international force backed up by the Lebanese army, allowing only Christian and Druze Lebanese to live in the region, which is highly unlikely, or a complete occupation.

If Israel is allowed to continue its incursions up to the Litani River for the next two months this may become a reality. But I’m skeptical about the desire or likelihood of Israel being able to control the area. However, as the case of the Golan Heights indicates, it’s happened before.

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UN deputy secretary general tells Blair, don’t be a back seat driver. Just get out of the car and walk home. Deputy Mark Malloch Brown told the Financial Times that France, the US, Egypt and Jordan should deal with the current Israel and Lebanese crisis and that Blair should learn to follow. One reason he says this is because of the invasion of Iraq. Many British newspapers lead this morning with the death of one solider in Basra (making it a total of 115 since invasion time) and three in Afghanistan. It seems that when it comes to leading the World in resolving international conflicts Blair is better off staying stumm.

With the onslaught in the Lebanon set to continue until a strong international force is in place the notion of a ceasefire seems to be moving further in to the future.

Olmert mentioned that French, British, Italian, Australian, and Turkish forces could be used but insisted that a ceasefire would only be achieved once this force is deployed.

Also, France, supported by the EU have delayed the sending of an international force until, according to the Washington Post, ‘there is greater certainty that a sustainable peace accord can be enforced’.

After a breakfast meeting on Tuesday morning between the United States, France and the three other permanent Security Council members, “France threatened to boycott a U.N.-sponsored meeting scheduled for Thursday, at which countries would be asked to consider contributing peacekeeping troops. A French official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said France believes it is "premature" to discuss such a force until there is a political settlement of the crisis”(WP).

So here we have the EU calling for an immediate cessation of hostilities (‘on both sides’ would chime in Blair from his sideline in San Francisco) and Israel (and the US booming from above) saying that a cessation will only occur once a ‘robust’ international force is in place.

And the bad news for Israel continues. According to the Israeli newspaper Haaretz with less than 72 hours notice Depeche Mode have cancelled their Tel Aviv show. In a story titled ‘End to Summer Fun’ (Fun?) Uri Misgav tells us that: “Some 40,000 Israelis had bought tickets by the time the show was canceled, and organizers were expecting 55,000 all told.

Depeche Mode, one of the most popular bands over the past 25 years, was supposed to provide the highlight of an event-packed summer that brought back color to the cheeks of Israeli music-lovers. But when the war with Hezbollah broke out, it became clear that the combat would be playing the final note.”

If they had turned up the significance of one of the songs would have played out chillingly across the packed auditorium. Because which ever way this conflict plays out, whether violence will stop before an international force is deployed (good for everyone except the Israelis now that they seem to have managed to stop HB’s rockets) or a force is deployed while Israeli operations are still going on (who’s going to sign up to that) it is ‘just a question of time’.

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The argument being put about that, in effect Hezbollah have won is headline grabbing, but the truth behind it is more subtle and scary.

Lebanese blogger Raja makes the argument that Hizbollah have won, not militarily but in terms of political capital:
“If Israel cannot even claim some sort of victory on the ground (however vague such a victory may be), the IDF will suffer utter humiliation, and thus have to deal with the short and long term consequences of such a defeat. If, on the other hand, Israel continues its offensive in search of that elusive victory, Hizballah's stature will only grow in prominence both in Lebanon and the entire region.

The fact the generals simply can't swallow is that it really does not matter how much of Hizballah's military capability they eliminate. As long as Hizballah retains its legitimacy, it will merely regroup and probably grow even stronger with time. And all it takes to reinforce that legitimacy is a massacre such as the one that transpired in Qana yesterday. As I wrote earlier in this entry, the military outcome of this war no longer matters: Hizballah has won - it is not going anywhere, and its losses are merely temporary.”

It’s an analysis that Prof. Oz Almog writing in Ynet today agrees with, to a point:
“We shall not win this war because the Hizbullah cannot be uprooted from Lebanon just as it is impossible to uproot the Moslem fundamentalism prevalent throughout Arab countries. We shall not win, because on the other side there is a group of anti-democratic people (not marginal in the Moslem world) who have legitimized lying and falsehood. It is a group that creates a reality by mere words and imagination and not by empirical methodology, free speech and self criticism. Even if Israeli tanks stand at Beirut's door, Nasrallah will present himself as Sallah al-Din, and even if all his fighters fall in battle – he will declare victory over the Zionists. And most of his admirers (and they are many) will accept his lies. But above all, we shall not win this war because it is a single battle, just one more promotional campaign leading to the real war whose signs are already on the horizon.”

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In the Douglas Coupland’s 1991 novel Generation X, the narrator says some down right dismissive things about those who still consider renting a video on a Saturday night to be the equivalent of ‘going out’. Considering that these days movie channels are showing movies for free, and every Sunday newspaper is giving away DVD’s with their half a kilo of reconstituted wood pulp, there's probably not a couch potato in the land who still thinks renting a newly released movie is a suitable replacement for a social life.

But mundane and everyday that it is renting DVDs is not without its risks. Take for example the risk of pushing yourself to the point of suicide when, half way through the movie you thoughtlessly rented you realize that the Sunday Mirror lied. The movie, contrary to the attributed quote on the box, is not ‘a laugh a minute’, but is instead ‘a big piece of shit’. The only laughter in the room is the hollow laughter of self-ridicule.

To avoid this risk you play safe. You only go for tried and tested directors, or maybe pick the films where you’ve actually read the reviews. At the very outside, you rent a film that you've heard from at least one mate that it won't have you looking at yourself in the bathroom mirror and screaming for four hours straight.

But that's all fine and well when you have plenty to choose from. What if it’s Ten O’Clock at night and there’s nothing left in your local Xtravision except 20 copies of some coming of age comedy/horror film with stock High School types that haven’t changed since Porky’s and 2 copies of Woody Allen’s Match Point.

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