"ISRAEL will support deployment of a temporary international peacekeeping force in southern Lebanon to ensure Hezbollah is removed from its border.
Defence Minister Amir Peretz suggested yesterday that the force would be led by NATO, but gave no time frame for any deployment.
"Because of the weakness of the Lebanese army, we will support a wide national force … which would deploy in the south," Haaretz newspaper's website quoted Mr Peretz as telling German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier."
Most of the NATO members have not shown strong support for Israel with the exception of the USA and some have shown hostilities. With that said it is also being reported;
"President Bush's chief of staff said Sunday international peacekeepers might be needed in Lebanon to help end the fighting between Israel and Hezbollah militants, but that U.S. troop involvement was unlikely.
Josh Bolten reaffirmed comments by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on Friday, ahead of her trip to the Middle East this week, that she did not think "it anticipated that U.S. ground forces are expected" for a potential peacekeeping contingent."
In the scenario I laid out I said the time was not ripe for it to take place now because of US support for Israel but that it could develop over time. I stand by that. If NATO goes into the region temporarily who knows when they will come out? With nations there whose sympathies are not with Israel and with the absence of US forces who knows what will develop over the next years.
Putting NATO into Southern Lebanon to stop Hizbollah attacks on Israel isn't quite the same thing as putting NATO into Kosovo to stop Serbian attacks on Albanians, is it.