I am not fluent in Israel politics but what I get from this article is that Olmert is left-wing moderate politician. Is it true? So if he steps down after this war, as he most likely will, instead of him you, Israelies will elect a right-wing ravaging lunatic who will wreak havoc and total war and destruction on your neighbours?

This is a very important article, but it doesnt address the history of irresponsible unilateral disengagement as implemented by Barak and then Sharon. Barak arrogantly left Lebanon and expected the Lebanese to implement UN resolutions, How naive. Sharon's peaceful disengagement in Gaza was implemented while Hizbollah is digging trenches and getting missiles. Come on lets give the politicians there due.

or, rather, traitors of their own nation.

The weapons, etc. are important, but the soul, the willingness to win is the key. That's why we won WWII and we MUST win WWIII against islam fanatics. The forces of light MUST win against the forces of darkness.

Amen. The left is in love with peace. Everyone wants peace in Israel but some people live in reality.... The arabs will never let Israel live in peace it is against there twisted beliefs!!!

BRILLIANT. But I cannot understand why it took so long for some Israelis to wake up. The left's heads will always be in the sand and I hope they die that way, they dont deserve to see the light. Get the heads of the politicians and the top brass in the IDF out of the sand before it's too late.

First, Halutz is an air force general. Command of the air is vital against another army. Against another air force. But it seems to me that there has been a terrible over reliance on air power here. You have a situation where they are firing scarce, expensive precision munitions against two guys in a field. Second, incrementalism is a killer. We learned that in Vietnam. Olmert is feeding men into this piece meal when he should have flooded the area. Third, why a push up from the border. Why not a push from the upper panhandle directly to the sea and cut off everbody to the south. Why not a helicopter landing or parachute landing at the Litani and then move south. It seems to me that Hezbollah has had six years to prepare for a move from the border and the IDF walked into it. Next, what does it take to become a general these days. I can't believe that Patton, Macarthur, Stone Wall Jackson, or for that matter Gideon or Joshua would have run the war in this manner. The men seem to be unsure of themselves, lacking something. The soldiers are the same. The fault lies with the high command for not thinking with imagination, audacity, and maybe most of all for just not getting the show on the road. Hezbollah has to be crushed here and Nasrallah has to end up like Hitler in the bunker. There simply is no other choice. And Olmert, Peretz, Halutz, and everybody else involved with the conduct of this war need to be facing a commission of inquiry when this is over. The roots of this go way back, and that includes Sharons swap of 400 terrorists for three bodies and a dubious businessman. But that's history. Olmert is not a war time prime minister. Peretz is not a wartime defense minister. And Halutz's performance has chief of staff has been in the words of Churchill at the Munich debate in the house of commons, "been weighed in the balance and found wanting."

An old Peter Paul and Mary song comes to mind, When will they ever learn, when will they learn The "they" now is the political leadership and the hairbrained intellectuals whether of the neo stalinist or noman chumpskish flavor. With the green light at the gate, we fumbled for change as the crowd who was in our corner cheered us on. yes there is a reason the political leadership hesitated. and yes it was the neurotically high percentage of Jewish egg heads who could not see clearly. Now that you have cleaned your spectacles, please don't let them get dirtied again. Let's let bygones be bygones and win this frickin war by destroying all the rocket launchers with what ever means at our disposal and then we kiss and make up and stay united

Sherman seems to be part of those determined to go to war no matter what. Haven't you counted the number of your dead yet? Perhaps those left-wingers are trying to tell you that Israel needs a new strategy - something else than: bomb them all...! It takes an educated & compassionate man to be able to listen - obviously not Sherman!

It isn't that Israel's military is incapable of beating the HIzbollah, it's that Israel is too concerned with how the world will react to the kind of military response that must take place. We should just do what we have to do, since no matter what we do, we are criticized for disproportionate responses. It's time to act without taking anything but our citizens' and soldier's safety into account.

Unless Sharon is suddenly a rabid left-winger, it was the RIGHT that took us in. Hizbollah would never have become a problem without 1982.

was the fly in the diplomatic soup. Neither Oz nor Olmert were wrong in their statements. But Olmert chose the wrong tools. Unilateralism and militarism are both refusals to treat with your opponent. The only way to treat is to talk. I can already hear furious observations about them not being willing to talk to us flying through the ether. You know and I know that we have not been willing to talk to them either. Step 1, through intermediaries, step 2 direct talks.

I heard Yossi Beilin this morning on the radio. For the left good is evil and evil is good. Only the enemy has the right to defend themselves and Jews should always be waiting the board the trains, silently and without making too much of a ruckus.

For the last 39 years (in the case of Gaza & the west bank) and the last 24 years (lebanon) the arab governments, the UN, EU and all of the left-wingers, marxists, hippies, western and arab intellectuals and other kool-aid drinkers have demanded time and time again that israel needs to withdraw from "the occupied lands"...and then the arabs would make peace,or least be willing to negotiate peace. Well now we see what happens when we withdraw (re-alignment) when there is no 21st century form of democratic government or authority already set up in those areas to provide stability & to prevent any terror attacks back into israel. The weak arab governments (lebanon & abbas in gaza) were allowing these lands to be used by the extremists to prepare for the next battle (which israel is fighting now) The weak arab "governments" (lebanon & the pa in gaza) are in no position to provide security for israel's southern & northern borders. Unfortunately Israel now needs to to totally go house by house and village by village to wipe out these terrorist scumbags. There is no other peace option for israel until these arab governments start to become either democratic & or at least some pressure is applied on them to fight terror ....the diplomatic gloves need to be taken off in lebanon & tighten the screws with abbas & hamas in gaza. NEXT TIME USE OVERWHELMING FORCE!!!!

The article makes observations which are right on target. Olmert's remarks linking resolution of the war with West Bank realignment (Aug. 1) showed just how attached he is to weak policies which have already proven their malignancy to the state of Israel. Even his decision to delay the ground offensive in response to US pressure (Aug. 10) displays questionable leadership in a time of crisis. This war is about the survival of Israel, not the US. It should be executed with victory in mind: the return of Regev and Goldwasser; not the negotiation of some "ceasefire". Anything less will embody a political degradation of the Jewish state; it's reduction to a condition of powerlessness in the face of its enemies.

Where did you disappear to? After months and months of waiting for your articles, I had almost given up. I don't want to sound too overly-enthusiastic, but you must continue giving you insight to the public. Keep on writing Martin, we need more voices like yours. Kol ha kavod.

I think the battle is being fought in the wrong place--The greatest instigator is Iran followed by Syria then Lebanon itself.The Lebanese government should have grasped the nettle long ago and ousted hezbollah so I am afraid I believe them to be a hostile government They allowed this to happen ---(lets face it Israel was becoming a bit of a joke-giving out land to appease,evicting its own citizens then treating them shamefully-the arabs must have thought sharon was on their side) ---and the sooner Israel stops pussyfooting around like a headless chicken the worse it is going to be for the middle east

Finally, a writer who sees the real situation.Send this article to Mr. Olmert.

his best friends are yossi sarid of the extreamist left meretz party and his whole family are leftwing extreamists: dana the daughter is in checkpointwatch, the wife is a "war(peace) Now" activist and his 2 sons are draft dodgers living outside of israel and are self hating jews. we jews know that you You-are-peons only like us one way: namley "DEAD" so we frankly dont give a damn what you antisemites think half a world away. you dont have to deal with kamikaze arabs trying blowthemselves up on buses and in cafes. and contrary to your belief that if we jews were no more the world would be a better place...the Muslims would just start claiming their "dar El-harb" (non-muslim lands slated for conquest i.e.: Spain, Greece, France etc...) So go back to greece and worry about suing the Macedonians and worrying about greater albania nikos. http://www.omdurman.org/dar_harb.html

To the 14000 rockets- Who knows how many "inaccurate launchers" ti accurate launchers they have? whos to say that they are duds, I know that if I bought a DUD then there would be problems with my supplier, and the supplier knows that; they are going to do their best to not have duds. Even so, say they have innacurate launchers, they still destroy things. They are not going to shoot up in the air like a firecracker, COME ON dont be dense. If they miss one target, another is still going to be destroyed. "grave dereliction of responsibility by the Israeli leadership"? Why is it that they need to have a plan? No One should have to have a plan to protect themselves. Is it me or is there any one else that thinks they should level the whole country and send a message to terrorists and the countries knowlingly harboring them. A message saying, "YOUR NEXT!!!!!!!" I dont live over there but I am tired of all this hatred. The Leaders of each country should disciplin their own country and get rid of all of the hate mongering Terrorists. There is Nothing HOLY about their attacks; it is only a group of people who get other people to kill and die so they can have a bvetter life "BRAINWASH" Thats it.

It seems to us living abroad now but with many years' experience residing in Israel, that now is not the time for people like Sherman to slag-off sections of the country. Perhaps there should be A BAN ON OPINION WRITING UNTIL THE WAR IS WON!

Take Hizbollah out now with a massive ground and air offensive. Negotiating with them or Lebanon is a waste of time. They will not abide by any agreement. if anything, try to negotiate with Iran that is in control of Hizbollah. I can see Olmert or Peres holding up a paper-a la Chamberlin- announcing that they have "peace in our time."

Perfectly said. It's imperative for Israel to hold current leaders (Olmert, Peretz & co.) accountable. After the war, true capable leaders must emerge, and Israel will act upon it. It must be reminded, however, that people get goverment they deserve (and vote for). Israelies voted for Kadima, and they are getting what they voted for (unfortunatelly). No doubt, that will change, but the price being paid is too high.

Olmert has never been a leftist. He was always on the right side of the Likud. sharon was too. They just gave up on the rights policies after trying them for 30 years.

The analysis of the dire intellectual bankrupcy of Israel's so called elite is sadly all to accurate. The Israeli public must bare some of the blame. Even taking into account the limitations of Israel's quasi democracy there is no excuse for the public to still put their faith in leaders who are ignorant, idioctic and corrrupt; leaders who sell false promises of peace while endangering our very existence. At the next ballot and through all other democratic means of dissent the public must show that it will not tolerate such failure. The "elite" should lose its pride of place and be disgraced for the calamity it has helped to reek on the Jewish people.

History tells us how to deal with fascists and nazis, and Hezbos. Did the Allies drop candygrams before taking out the nazis? Did Churchill say, "let's give diplomacy more time to work" when the nazis firebombed London? Did the Allies telegraph the invasion of Europe? Did the Allies say, "let's only go to Normandy" and sue for peace with Hitler? They DID say, let's march all the way to Berlin, take out the nazis, free the oppressed, and rebuilt the entire country.