Why the Middle East Crisis is important?

Yesterday I read this post in the blog of the BBC editors blog.

It was about the statistics of war, and how much coverage was given to the current conflicts in the world.

The editor of the Ten O'clock News at the BBC tried to justify why the story which implicated fewer lost of human lives was not the most important, but the one with less time on air. He pointed as reasons the complexity of the story, the relations of that story with other conflicts which are developing in the World and the fact it comes from the "Middle East" as the main reasons why that story was the main international story.

I think those reasons where all true, from the point of view of a journalist, but there is another one: The other stories, both were yesterday's news (the Iraq story is more than three years old and It has been the main international story for almost all of those three years and the Congolese conflict has been an ongoing conflict since almost the replacement of Zaire by the Democratic Republic of Congo in 1997) and the Middle East Crisis is today's news, just two weeks old.

But I want to explain Why I think the Middle East Crisis is so important in other sense: looking from the point of view of the international relations.

I mean: Why just two weeks after the begin of the attacks of Israel into Lebanon there was a meeting of international leaders trying to give a solution to the crisis?

Just because is now a Middle East Crisis. Is an international conflict which could turn into a regional conflict.

The Iraqi Violence have been going for years, but confined to the Iraqi soil, mostly as a civil war between Sunnis and Shia's (is a little bit more complex than that, but those are the basics) and do not involve forces from other countries (besides the United States and coalition forces, who are just observers and try to not get into the conflict), specially not forces from the region. The Iraqi violence can turn into an international or regional conflict if one of the these two countries enter into the Iraqi conflict:

First Iran, which is not probable, because the Shi'a leader, those supported by Iran, have recognized the government of Iraq and now their main objective is to calm down the country so the coalition forces couldn't have more reasons to be in Iraq.

The other option is the involvement of Turkey in the North, which is really difficult because the Kurdish have assumed their status quo and do not want to extend their territories.

Iraq of course, is in the headlines now, because It's Prime Minister was visiting the United States, more than for the violence in Iraq itself which is just a two minutes story, with images from a news agency rather than those which comes directly from the network who is airing the story.

The Congolese conflict had not been international since like 2003, after the withdrawal of the Rwandan and Ugandan forces. From that year on the civil war has continued, but mostly within the Congolese frontiers. This conflict is on the news because of the elections that will be held on this week-end, which can end the violence. This will be the first free elections in 40 years in that country.

Although Craig Oliver didn't mention It, I cannot avoid the Somalia issue. This is also a civil war, but It's turning into a international conflict. This is not yet a regional one, but It's slowly turning into that, after the involvement of Ethiopian forces.

This conflict it's becoming more important from the point of view of the international relations, but, sadly, there will not be many news about It in the TV bulletins, mostly, because the "good guys" are loosing and they are not the good guys in the eyes of the Somalis.

Getting back to the Middle East Crisis, the current phase of the crisis began with the kidnap of two Israeli soldiers by a Palestinian radical group, at this point it was just one more incident in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict that has been going on since 2001.

But then a Lebanese radical group followed the move and kidnap two more soldiers, answered by the Israelis with attacks on Lebanon, then Hezbollah answered with rockets against Northern Israel and what is the current Middle East Crisis.

The first problem in the current crisis is the possibility of a reissue of the Lebanon War which lasted 30 years, until 2000, in the South of Lebanon with the Israelis fighting Hezbollah, a war which ended not because of one side won, but because of an accident and an election in Israel.

The other problem is that the probabilities of involvement of other countries are high. Syria and Iran have many interest in the region, specially Syria in the Golan Heights (a portion of Syria which is occupied by the Israeli just as the South portion of Lebanon was occupied by them in an attempt to stop Hezbollah from attacking Northern Israel).

fortunately this problem has been avoided for the moment, with the announcement made by the Israeli defense Forces they will not advance any further into the Lebanese territory.

But today Al-Qaeda say they will respond to the attacks made by the Israeli forces in Lebanon, which is difficult and can only be seen as opportunistic (this because Al-Qaeda is a Sunni organization and Hezbollah is Shi'a, with is the same to say Protestants and Catholics in Ireland, they are both Muslims and Arabs, but those are the only things they got in common). I don't think Al-Qaeda can respond to the attacks in Lebanon and be seen by the Shi'as as the heroes of the hole Islamic Faith, but if they do it, they will be the absolute winners in this conflict.

The current Middle East crisis is a crisis since It get out of Israeli territory.

But, as Condolezza Rice has said, and most analysis agree with that, the conflict has roots which are beyond the problem of a ceasefire. A ceasefire could help, but will not solve the problem.

The solution would not be easy, but the main reason why to focus on the crisis is not to solve it, just try to put a limit, in relation to both time, and territory.

Just Remember that Israel has atomic weapons and maybe Iran has them too.