"Act of War" -- the end of one era and beginning of another

Israel began an attack on Lebanon this morning, after two Israeli soldiers were captured.

"The Lebanese government is responsible. Lebanon will pay the price," Olmert warned. "This morning's events are not a terror attack but the action of a sovereign state, which attacked Israel without any reason."

"We will take Lebanon 20 years back," Israel's army chief Dan Halutz was quoted as saying by the private Channel 10 television.

"We must stop the restraint and the diplomatic dialogue and move to a serious military move against anyone who is linked and sends these people," said Avigdor Yitzhaki, the leader of Israel's coalition bloc in parliament.

--Middle East Times

An interesting comment on the website, "The Return of the Nephilim," whose motto is "looking for truth in a world of many lies:"

Rumors of War Against Israel: The Hamas Authority Declares War on Israel. Orders security forces to repel IDF incursion. [Wait a minute. How many times are these bastards of Satan going to declare war on Israel? Israel is the one that needs to declare war against them!]

That line was posted Monday. I do consider this website just a tad paranoid, but it's fun to read. And sometimes they get it right (by "right" I mean their opinion agrees with mine!)

In the Jerusalem Post, Yesha rabbis are calling for "extermination of the enemy:"

The Yesha Rabbinical Council blamed the attack on the north on Wednesday morning on a "weakening of our grip on the land of Israel."

The rabbis saw the attack as a "direct continuation of relinquishing [territory] and weakness."

The Council called on the IDF to ignore Christian morals and "exterminate the enemy in the north and the south." They advised that an emergency government be established to "fight the true enemy as is appropriate, and to rescind orders to destroy and evict Jews."

I feel that, while the rhetoric remains the same, this escalation marks the end of an era of posturing and saber-rattling, and the beginning of something else. Something more violent, if that is possible. At least something more direct, the way wars were fought before terrorism took over as the M.O. of the Davids who want to take on the Goliaths.

There are those who have said that bombing terrorist-supporting countries back into the Middle Ages is the way to end terrorism. (And others who said that's a short trip.) I guess we'll see if this assessment is correct.