Not surprisingly, there is growing consternation if not outrage about the devastation brought about by Israel's bombing of targets inside Lebanon. Without a doubt, there will be demands that Israel compensates the Lebanese for this destruction, estimated by Al-Fadl Shalaq, head of the Hizballah Fundraising Committee (Lebanese) Council for Development and Reconstruction at $3.6 billion, a figure Reuters, Aftenposten, eagerly lap up.
Images are flying, of the same Beirut neigborhood, and of internally displaced people sleeping in parking garages.
These image should disturb all of us, but I've learned to be deeply suspicious. When Shalag rhetorically asks what would happen if 25% of all French were displaced in the month of August, he's in fact describing reality - I would estimate at least 25% of all French people displace themselves to go on vacation. And before somebody jumps down my throat, yes, I realize that fleeing a war is different from taking a week with the kids on the beach, or in the mountains. But the mere fact that a large portion of a country moves itself all at once is not as radical as one might first assume - and these people had plenty of notice.
By the same token, as horrible as the rubble is in Haret Hreik and Qana, we simply do not have anything approaching an objective consideration of how widespread the damage is. And I haven't seen a lot of pictures of the area around Kiryat Shemona.
And, of course, nobody is writing up headlines about the economic damage done to Israel - which can be measured not just in terms of destruction, but also the opportunity cost of shutting down Northern Israel and mobilizing several divisions of reserve troops.
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