Israel has and will continue to pour more troops and air power into this thing until Hezbollah has very little infrastructure left. This will take a few weeks at best. Any talks of cease-fires are illusionary and to help settle financial market.
Exactly.
Israel has cut off resupply, and reinforcements... basically these guys can sit in their tunnels and pill boxes and while they will probably be able to do some pot shot damage here and there, are basically trapped and will be weeded out by slow methodical movement of Isrealis and attrition.
In a perfect world, western troops would form a wall along the Iraqi border and let the israelis march all the way through Syria straight to the Iraqi border.. ending any real threat to stability to isreal from the north or Iraq from the east. Leaving Iran as the sole player to be dealt with in the region.. and with it surrounded on the east and west by western troops, will be rapidly subdued....
I know, I know.. won't happen.. but its certainly what should be happening if the civilized world is truly serious about winning the war on terror.
Well, the "International Community" talks cease fire, but they can't offer anything that would be remotely acceptable to either Israel OR the hezbos. Imagine a "force with teeth" led by FRANCE. Gimme a break. Non starter.
I doubt the conflict between Israel and Lebanon has much real effect on the financial market at this point.
Neither country is of great significance to markets. The real danger to the markets would be if Syria or Iran got involved. Iran is talking tough, but they are keeping the oil exports steadily flowing despite the rhetoric. Syria isn't even playing the rhetoric game.
There's some oil price speculation going on, but that's more about people trying to guess how other people will react rather than real concerns about supply.
The markets are much more concerned about economic indicators showing consumer spending, inflation, and what the Fed might to with interest rates.