Well, the one office where I am spending quite a bit of time these days. On a clear day, you see forever.

Not only did the Hirsi Ali affair bring down the Dutch government, it was a phenomenal example of what has gone wrong in western societies, particularly in Europe, over the past few decades. AEI’s Christopher DeMuth uses it as a case study to underline six common problems which that are accelerating the steady moral decay of the western world. They are, according to DeMuth, the following: (1) ” terrorism’s global reach and use of technology, (2) the social and political failures in the Middle East, (3) mass migration caused by wealth disparities, (4) failure of democracies, (5) the extreme division of labor and, one of my absolute favorites, (6) the fallout created by excessive wealth and self-gratification:

Sixth, life in the wealthy liberal societies has become exceptionally pleasant and gratifying. We like it that way, and many of us have come to resent any impositions on our repose and peace of mind. A striking characteristic of Western society, especially its elites, is that violence and the use of force have come to be abhorred per se--regardless of whether it is of the offensive, destructive sort or of the defensive, self-preserving sort.

Exactly.

David Frum once more explains, cogently, the Iran angle and why Hezbollah’s destruction is of paramount importance.

And how it pollutes a new generation: Birthday registries for kids.

Conrad Black is putting the time he’s out on bail to good use with regular columns in the National Post, last Saturday’s (behind a subscriber wall) highlighted a theme that has made a compelling comeback over the past few weeks:

“ This is war-making, but it is executed crisply, that is often the only method of peacekeeping ”

Of course, his reflection refers to the Israel-Hezbollah war and Victor Davis Hanson was kind enough to – not for the first time – explore why old fashioned peacekeeping hasn’t helped in resolving that particular conflict:

Syria and Iran have never been more isolated; neither was isolated when Bill Clinton praised the “democracy” in Tehran or when an American secretary of State sat on the tarmac in Damascus for hours to pay homage to Syria ’s gangsters. Israel is at last being given an opportunity to unload on jihadists; that was impossible during the Arafat fraud that grew out of the Oslo debacle.

Only a decisive war can create the conditions for the establishment of a lasting peace and only the destruction of the radical zealots who initiated this war in the first place can bring this about. That is, if a viable democratic and open society can be nurtured on the rubble that decades of jihadist deceit and western acquiescence have created.

What is interesting to me is how for instance in Europe deep misconceptions continue to exist by separating warmaking and peacekeeping and how these two are considered to be very different approaches to a problem. Of course, this separation has in no small part contributed to the rather absurd overreaction to Israel’s actions by some European leaders and notably by a number of UN officials. Past missions by both - the former Yugoslavia being a case in point - indicate that reliance on peace and reconstruction doesn’t necessarily end a conflict or war.

Thankfully there is always a live example to illustrate the point and some of you may remember the deep rift in Dutch politics over the deployment of Dutch troops in Afghanistan earlier this year. The mission got a parliamentary go ahead only on the government accepting the condition that it was to be a peacekeeping and reconstruction exercise only, fighting terrorists it was felt was best delegated to American troops in the region. Well, in order to start that reconstruction effort the Dutch had to wage a bit of war last week on locally active Taliban groups:

Dutch commandos killed 18 enemy fighters who set up positions in rugged hills overlooking a Dutch camp in southern Afghanistan, the country's military chief said Friday. There were no Dutch casualties during a 10-day mission.

Hopefully this experience will help redefine the traditional interpretation of peacekeeping and merge it with warmaking, giving the peace effort that what it has always lacked: teeth.

UPDATE: Some good comments from Michael Barone.

Will be the theme of a three-day conference in Amsterdam organized by Reason Magazine in late August. The program looks very interesting with Peaktalk friends Bruce Bawer and Andrew Sullivan making appearances. If you're in the area - which I unfortunately won't be - it is highly recommended.

The Dutch will go to the polls for a general election later this year – November to be precise - and one party in particular is projected to do well, namely the Socialist Party, a more radical and doctrinaire Labour Party offshoot. Its leader, Jan Marijnissen, made headlines last week by comparing jihadist terrorism to the Dutch resistance during World War II:

" Terrorism is a recurring thing throughout history and often has the intention to make life for an occupying power as difficult as possible. The Dutch have, during the Second World War here blown up city halls in order to disrupt Nazi Germany’s machine of destruction – most city halls kept registries with names of Jewish citizens. In the Middle East, things are not that different. Islamic fundamentalism, including its terrorist subsidiary, is a reaction to the occupation of Palestine by Israel, the American presence in the Middle East and the support of undemocratic regimes in the Middle East by the west "

Not only a false and to some highly insulting analogy, Marijnissen also fails to note that radical Islam is driven by religion and not by politics, a point that is not often understood in Europe's secular circles. As we have seen over the past few weeks, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is merely a useful conduit to expand the radical Islamic franchise as is so eloquently explained by Amir Taheri in the Times today:

The problem is that since the Iranian regime is Shi’ite it would not be easy to sell it to most Arabs, who are Sunni. To overcome that hurdle, it is necessary to persuade the Arabs that only Iran is sincere in its desire and capacity to wipe Israel off the map. Once that claim is sold to the Arabs, so Ahmadinejad hopes, they would rally behind his vision of the Middle East instead of the “American vision”.

The jury is out on whether the Palestinians would really enjoy life under Ahmadinejad’s Shi’ite umbrella, but that’s a topic for a very different discussion.

In the meantime Marijnissen has hurried to tone down his original comment on his own weblog as Dutch pollsters predict that he will pick up some 10% of the vote if an election were held today. If he does indeed manage that in November, the Socialist Party may become a player in parliament, possibly holding the balance of power. I will leave it to your imagination as to how that would affect the Dutch, and to some extent the European, debate over waging war on terror.

Pajamas Media has been on top of Middle East events and commentary over the past few weeks, here is the latest. Co-founder Roger Simon makes an important point in a PJ news release:

"We are increasing our podcast program overall," states Simon. "We had recently published podcast interviews focusing on US issues with Senator Rick Santorum and through Instapundit's Glenn and Helen Show, with Senator John McCain. When the Middle East conflict started to expand we wanted to get access to an Israeli official. We weren't sure we could, but we tried and were able to land an interview with the Israeli US Ambassador Daniel Ayalon. Our interview lasted 14 minutes compared to cable news organizations of perhaps 3- 4 minutes. This flexible timeframe is one of our advantages compared to the more sound bite oriented mainstream media approach"

Personally, I believe that mainstream cable news coverage of the conflict has become totally unwatchable. In the past week most Canadian news outlets have started their top-of-the-hour news reports with endless and meaningless updates of the evacuations of foreigners from Lebanon’s shores as if it were a crucial and defining issue, a feat enthusiastically replicated over at CNN. Some of that coverage approached Katrinaesque levels of hysteria while the key purpose of tuning in - at least for me - was to get some solid battlefront coverage and possibly updates from the diplomatic front. None of that, and if you got it was often highly biased and devoid of any direct relevance. News and commentary, including raw footage are now sourced almost exclusively on the net.

Another interesting development is that blogs are proving to be an incredibly useful tool to go beyond enemy lines and try to forge relationships where they previously had been impossible. My friends at Augean Stables have been in a lengthy discussion with Omar, a Palestinian based in Jordan, and Lisa Goldman notes the following remarkable thing:

The internet has also been offering some surreal experiences, like the ability to have a Beirut-Tel Aviv online IM chat in real time while the missiles are falling. That's what happened to me and this blogger a few nights ago. We chatted while he was sitting on the roof of his apartment building in Beirut, watching missiles from Israeli planes fall on his city and describing it to me. He was carrying on an online conversation with another Israeli at the same time. And he was able to describe his feelings and the atmosphere in a human, personal way that no newspaper article or television news segment could achieve.

Extraordinary.

With Israeli forces close to launching a major incursion into Lebanese territory I was reminded of this classic Reagan anecdote, when Israel made its first call to the gates of Beirut in 1982. Former NSC staffer Geoffrey Kemp recalls as follows:

“Menachem, this is a holocaust” Reagan said.

“Mr. President, I think I know what a holocaust is” Begin replied, in a voice that Kemp would recall as “dripping with sarcasm”. According to Deaver, Reagan continued “in the plainest of language” to tell Begin what he thought about the bombing of Beirut, concluding by saying, “It has gone too far. You must stop it”.

Twenty-minutes later Begin called back and said he had issued the order to Sharon to stop the bombings. After he had hung up the phone Reagan said to Deaver, “I didn’t know I had that kind of power”.

(from Lou Cannon’s President Reagan, The Role of a Lifetime)

This snippet from the past is instructive on many levels, especially Reagan’s insistence combined with his astonishment over Begin’s prompt response. The reason I reprint it is not so much to suggest that George should treat Olmert in exactly the same manner, but we should be very aware that there still isn’t that much that a US president needs to do in order to direct Israeli actions. And Menachem was made of sterner stuff than Olmert, I believe.

Probably, yes. I have been incredibly busy over the past few months, on the business side, but also with family and lesser important issues such as cutting trees on my property, watching the World Cup soccer (loved it but glad that it is over, as always) and of course enjoying the summer which doesn’t last very long up here.

More seriously, shortly after the Ayaan Hirsi Ali crisis – which brought lots of new readers to this site - and my Dutch sojourn I was all of a sudden overwhelmed by a deep need to take a break from the blog. Holidays allow you to take that perspective, but they also take you out of the daily posting mode which is hard to get back into if you’re somewhat unmotivated and distracted. It also felt that the blog was becoming repetitive despite many protestations from various readers who tried to convince me otherwise. A general feeling of ‘drop the blog’ was furthermore reinforced by this excellent post from Donald Sensing – one of the early blogging stars – who pretty much slams the medium as a single-person venture. He is very right, but at the same time he isn’t because a blog is not just a media venture, it is also a passionate effort that enables and opens the door to incredible networking experiences and can provide the stage for further activities. It is never an end in itself, and that ultimately made me decide to get back into swing of it, although don’t expect any mega-posts soon. There will however be no shortage of material, the Dutch are gearing up for an early election in the fall and as I write this the Middle East is in deep turmoil, so stay tuned.

Oh yes, the other thing I did during the break was read this book. Giving up the blog? How could I ever have thought that to be possible?

"I took a few minutes to read some Lebanese blogs, too. And I saw that, for many, the hate is taking over. That fragile dialogue between Israeli and Lebanese bloggers has been undermined by that nutty, fanatical, hate-filled man with the turban. Hang on, wasn't our abhorrence of him one of the things we had in common just one week ago?"

Lisa Goldman on her blog which I consider to be a must-read, crisis or no crisis.

"We slept very well, but around 6 AM my wife, our daughter and I woke up to the sound of sirens. After that we heard some muffled bangs. We waited for about twenty minutes, listened to the radio to make sure nothing unusual landed, and then we all went to have a pee. Except for our three-year-old son, he was still sleeping"

"Twenty minutes ago we heard several loud bangs and booms. I went down to the security room and closed the window and the iron door that covers it. Before I closed them I was able to see the places where the missiles ( one blogger correctly pointed out that we are not talking about rockets ) fell. We live on a mountain between Haifa University and the Technion, overlooking large parts of the Haifa Bay and the road to Acre. More bangs were heard. I called my wife, who went with our children to her parents' house one street below ours. They were fine, they also entered the security room"

This as well as great anecdotes and analysis, some of it in Dutch unfortunately, over at Bert de Bruin's Dutchblog Israel which I check out more than a few times a day now.

Addressing proportionality and the role of Lebanon, Israel's ambassador to the US, Daniel Ayalon speaks to Pajamas Media's Roger Simon. Similar and equally useful points are made by Israel's Ambassador to the UN, Dan Gillerman.