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What Is Kofi Annan Doing for the Kidnapped Israeli Soldiers?
by Judea Pearl and Ruth Pearl
 As the parents of Daniel Pearl, the Wall Street Journal's reporter who was kidnapped and brutally murdered in Pakistan in 2002, we share the anguish of the families of the kidnapped Israeli soldiers, and their frustration with the international community for failing to secure the release of their loved ones. Secretary-General Kofi Annan's call for the unconditional release of these soldiers has been ignored. So now the families of Ehud Goldwasser, Eldad Regev, and Gilad Shalit are asking to meet with Kofi Annan, to ask him to mobilize and intensify the efforts of the international community. The time has come for Mr. Annan to personally and aggressively intervene. (Wall Street Journal)
Hizballah's "Victory"
by Charles Krauthammer
 Hizballah may have won the propaganda war, but on the ground it lost. Badly. Hizballah lost hundreds of its best fighters. A deeply entrenched infrastructure on Israel's border is in ruins. The great hero has had to go so deep into hiding that Nasrallah has been called "the underground mullah." As the dust settles, the Lebanese are furious at Hizballah for provoking a war that brought them nothing but devastation - and then crowing about victory amid the ruins. The Arabs know where their interests lie. And they do not lie with a Shiite militia that fights for Iran. Hizballah is in no position, either militarily or politically, for another round. (Washington Post)
Human Rights Watch vs. Human Rights
by Joshua Moravchik
There was of course no dependable method by which Human Rights Watch could assess the veracity of what it was told by the "witnesses." Indeed, there was no means by which it could be sure that they
were not Hizballah cadres, since members of the group do not ordinarily wear uniforms or display identity badges. As for the absence of physical signs of Hizballah's presence at bomb sites, the report seemed to assume that the group would have left in place damaged weapons and fallen and injured comrades during the hours, or more likely days, that passed before HRW's investigators arrived at each site. For the especially grave accusation that civilian deaths were inflicted "deliberately," no evidence was offered. (Weekly Standard)
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Hizballah's Rocket Campaign against Northern Israel: A Preliminary Report
by Uzi Rubin
 Rockets and rocket launchers emerged as one of the defining weapons of the second Lebanon War and will remain so in the foreseeable future. This impacts on the security of U.S. and Western interests in the Middle East. Effective response measures must be devised and deployed as soon as possible. Two objectives should be pursued: first, to reduce the "Flash to Bang" (Hizballah rocket launch to Israeli response) cycle time to a few seconds from the time of launcher location pinpointing; and second, to develop and deploy effective and affordable active defense against rockets to protect vital civilian and military installations. (Institute for Contemporary Affairs-Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs)
Terrorist Theater Tricks
by Caroline Glick
 What are we seeing when we watch events from the Middle East on our television screens? Is it news or is it terrorist theater? Let us observe media events which occurred last week in Gaza. Sunday afternoon released hostages and Fox News journalists Steven Centanni and Olaf Wiig spoke before the cameras. The fact of their release and their statements were reported by more than 1,000 news organizations throughout the world. (Jerusalem Post)
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