The U.S. evacuation effort, criticized for a slow start, began what officials called “a dramatic ramp-up” on Wednesday. The State Department, after days of angry grumbling from U.S. nationals and several legislators, had said Tuesday that it was waiving a legal requirement that Americans be billed for evacuation costs.
As one senator pointed out at an agry House the other day, a country that spends billions to search for WMD’s in Iraq can afford to ferry to safety some of its citizens abroad, getting them out of the way of a war that America supports.
And, late, yes, but progress is coming along quite well now:
The U.S.-chartered cruise ship Orient Queen left Beirut on Wednesday with 900 passengers, most of them Americans. The ship and its naval escort left later than expected, as they waited for Americans who had registered to depart but were struggling to reach the port.
On Thursday, as what eventually will be a nine-ship U.S. Navy group swings into operation, at least 2,000 Americans are expected to be picked up; that number is set to double on Friday. The Pentagon said it was contracting for use of a second cruise ship with a capacity of up to 1,200 passengers.
Six big CH-53 helicopters continued to shuttle between Beirut and Cyprus, now carrying more than 200 passengers a day. Officials estimate that more than one-fifth of the 25,000 Americans in Lebanon are trying to leave.
I can just imagine that it’s complete hell over there right now for many on the Lebanese side. I have also heard much criticism of the Israeli government over the constant bombardment of Lebanon, but considering that Hezbollah, which is part of the Lebanese government, started the attacks, let’s not be too hasty to fault the historically default bad guy: the Jews.
Very much shame on the Lebanese and Syrian governments, however, for failing to take measures to stop the carnage in Lebanon. Israeli officials have made it quite clear that they are more then willing to stop the bombing once Hezbollah is disbanded from southern Lebannon, the soldiers are returned to Israel, and the bombings in Haifa cease.
Of course the withdrawal of Hezbollah from southern Lebannon is part of a years old-United Nations resolution to remove the Hezbollah threat from Israel …. a resolution that never got acted upon. So before the international community and Kofi Annan get on their soap box yet again to denounce the actions of the Promised Land, maybe the UN as a whole would first like to keep to the promises it made to help protect Israel in the first place …
… but then we would only have the “good guys” to blame in the latest Middle Eastern War …
