As we write this editorial, United Nations relief coordinator Jan Egeland has condemned the destruction caused by Israeli airstrikes in Beirut as a 'violation of humanitarian law'. Meanwhile the website of Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert leads with his proclamation to the Members of Knesset: "This is a National Moment of Truth".
If the microphone had been left on during a conversation between George W. Bush and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, we might have heard words of praise from the US President - "Nice work" perhaps. What we did hear in the actual electronic gaffe was equally disturbing. As The Observer put it on Sunday, "When Tony Blair offers himself as a Middle East peace envoy, he is casually rebuffed by the American President between bites on a bread roll". Bush tells him: "Condi is going". A moment of truth.
The effort to evacuate Australians was a distraction for Australia's leaders. Still, Alexander Downer was was quick to justify Israel's actions: "They are trying to destroy Hezbollah, which is trying, in turn, to destroy Israel". That was before we heard the UN's Jan Egeland describe the results of those efforts as a "violation of international humanitarian law". We expect to hear Downer develop his view during the course of the week.
In this issue of Eureka Street, Andrew Hamilton identifies the cost as the diminishment of humanity of both the agents and the victims of the violence. He says humanity also requires a certain standard in the conditions of daily life for the citizens of a country. Human dignity suffers in the face of poverty and insecurity, in various measures, in Lebanon, Palestine and Israel.
In another article, Muath Amayreh of the Australian National University regrets that Israel's actions will cause a deviation in the attempts of many Arabs and Muslims to understand the Western World. In fear, he is moved to quote the response of the prophet Kahil Gibran when asked about good and evil: "When good is hungry it seeks food in dark caves, and when it thirsts it drinks even of dead water".
This edition also sees the welcome return of Anthony Ham, a Eureka Street contributor of many years standing who looks at some of the poorest nations of the world; Jack Waterford, who gives us his take on events in Canberra in his Capital Letter; Morag Fraser, former editor, on the images that have