The New Republic

The United Nations performs again. And also the Lebanese army. Well, not exactly. According to Security Council Resolution 1701, the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL), which has been there for almost three fruitless decades, was supposed to be beefed up (that is, tripled in size) with real soldiers and given more arms and to perform the task of peace-keeping more--shall we say?--aggressively. Lebanon's army was supposed to displace and replace Hezbollah in the south.

Everybody knows that none of this has happened. Including the Israelis who for some reason ran from the place as soon as a cease-fire was agreed upon. That cease-fire is a vapid document, like most U.N. documents. 1701 is now a dead letter. The evidence piles up, and nobody seems to care. A Jerusalem Post correspondent, Jacey Herman, sneaked into Lebanon and filed a dispatch this morning, datelined Baalbeck in the north, reporting on the brazen movement of weapons from Lebanon. Soon they will be deployed, and then there will be Lebanon War III. But this time, Israel won't leave the theatre until the play is really over.

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