Browsing: none of the contending parties seems to want either war or peace. Retribution seems to fit with each of their strategies. That is the latest Middle East tragedy

   Now, two weeks later, the stakes for all sides are much higher. A Hezbollah rocket attack killed 12 children in a village in the Golan Heights, and Israel’s response—an air assault on Beirut that killed Fuad Shukr, a senior Hezbollah commander—raised the stakes. At virtually the same time, Israel also carried out the assassination in Tehran of Ismail Haniyeh, a key figure in the Hamas leadership.