"Defeat for Israel--either on the battlefield or via coerced compromises to achieve flawed cease-fires--is a defeat for U.S. interests; it will inspire radicals of every stripe, release Iran and Syria to spread more mayhem inside Iraq, and make more likely our own eventual confrontation with this emboldened alliance of extremists. Victory--in the form of Hezbollah's disarmament, the expulsion of the Iranian military presence from Lebanon, the eviction of Meshal and friends from Damascus, and the demise of the Hamas government in Gaza--is, by the same token, also a victory for U.S. (and Western) interests.
Thoroughly agreed. I guess I'm bemoaning the idea that the US has to get involved with every running sore POS country that is apparently coming to believe that creating an ever-fouler stench is a better approach than solving its' own issues. It's a lousy precedent and it's hard (for me) to see why the beneficiaries would want to change their behavior given the rewards.