Claudia Rosett on United Nations on National Review Online

Claudia Rosett on United Nations on National Review Online: "And, as we now know, just four months after Annan’s handshake with Nasrallah, Hezbollah in its “emerging political, economic and social role” went on in October, 2000, to kidnap three Israeli soldiers from inside Israel — murdering them all. UNIFIL’s contribution was to hand over at gunpoint to Hezbollah the bloodstained vehicles in which the Israelis were apparently kidnapped, conceal from Israeli authorities for months videotapes of the evidence, and then “observe” for more than five years as Hezbollah trucked in weapons from Iran and Syria, honeycombed southern Lebanon with fortifications and launched the recent bout of ruinous war with the July 12 kidnapping of another two Israeli soldiers, whom Hezbollah has yet to return.

Annan himself may be oblivious to the damage done to the real cause of peace by his favored brand of thug-hugging U.N. “diplomacy,” but the rest of us will be living with it long after he has retired. Right now, Annan has no more business talking with Hezbollah than he would have visiting the Iranian exhibition of holocaust cartoons that opened Monday in Tehran. Or should we brace for that as well?"