The press in the Middle East is in ferment over the latest crisis involving Israel and its Lebanese and Palestinian neighbours.
Most commentators in Israel believe a tough response to the Hezbollah attack is the right course of action, and the government is accused of weakness over its security policy.
Comments in the Arabic world and Iran vary from satisfaction that Hezbollah has dealt Israel a blow, to pleas to replace violence with negotiation.
Lebanon
COMMENT IN LEBANON'S AL-NAHAR
The daring and successful operation by Hezbollah yesterday has opened a new and decisive page not only in the history of the Arab-Israeli conflict but in that of the Middle East region as a whole.
COMMENT IN LEBANON'S AL-ANWAR
The Hezbollah operation has surprised the Lebanese and the Israelis alike. The Lebanese had promised themselves a summer of tourism and the Israelis were happy practising their favourite sport of genocide and massacres in Gaza under the eyes of sadistic international public opinion.
Palestinian Authority
EDITORIAL IN PALESTINIAN AL-QUDS
The Arab and Muslim states, as well as the rest of the world, have to exert pressure on Israel to stop its aggression against our people and south Lebanon and to choose a political solution. The ball is now in the Israeli court - Israel can either insist on continuing the escalation or return to the negotiating table.
COMMENT IN PALESTINIAN AL-HAYAT AL-JADIDAH
The circle of war is getting larger and larger... Israel's war in Gaza and southern Lebanon is paving the way to all-out war unless someone takes a courageous decision that negotiations are better than this war, violence and hatred.
COMMENT IN PALESTINIAN AL-AYYAM
The reason for these current and future wars is Israel and its mentality, ideology and greed. This is the ideology of subduing the other to destroy its lifestyle and if possible kill it. This is the rationale of arrogance, force and diktats - a despicable racist rationale that sees the life of one soldier who fell captive in battle as being more precious than the life of a whole people and the dignity of a whole nation.
Israel
COMMENT IN ISRAEL'S TOP CIRCULATION YEDIOT AHARONOT
From now on, the Israeli response will be total. A few days of a firestorm, mainly from the air, will not leave one Hezbollah installation standing. And this will have a price. Hezbollah has prepared for this confrontation for at least five years... beginning with the firing of rockets at military targets in the north, then firing at civilian targets and finally hitting deep in Israel. We must be ready.
COMMENT IN ISRAEL'S CENTRE-RIGHT MA'ARIV
[Hezbollah's actions] are indeed a dangerous provocation and insolent violation of the international commitments Beirut took upon itself. However, their severity has left Israel scope to decide its military response... leaving the government in Jerusalem but one possibility - to respond immediately with force.
BINYAMIN NETANYAHU IN MA'ARIV
On this hard day we must remember the basic facts: Israel is a strong state; the people of Israel are a strong people; the IDF [Israeli Defence Forces] is a strong army. The policy of the government of Israel is the weak link. The time has come to change direction. The policy of unilateral withdrawal followed by that of restraint and shutting the eyes is what enabled the terrorist organisations to dare to hit our soldiers in the north and in the south.
COMMENT IN ISRAEL'S LEFTIST HA'ARETZ
The IDF's return to southern Lebanon, just two weeks after its return to Gaza, will certainly increase doubts in Israel regarding Olmert's unilateral policy. Now, he will have a harder time convincing anyone that it is possible to withdraw from the West Bank without sufficient security arrangements.
EDITORIAL IN ISRAEL'S HA'ARETZ
In the state of war that Israel is facing in the [Palestinian] territories and vis-a-vis Hezbollah, its deterrent ability must be bolstered, especially because abductions can indicate that this ability has indeed been eroded - but Israel must not let the abductions drag it into a regional war.
COMMENT IN ISRAEL'S NATIONAL RELIGIOUS PARTY'S HATZOFE
The state of Israel has found itself fighting on two fronts, both of which we withdrew from unilaterally - two sectors from which we withdrew defeated because the leaders promised that the pullout would bring peace or at least calm, and the people of Israel, a pathetic people, believed them. Israel's leaders, as usual, tried to shift responsibility from themselves to the doors of the Arab leaders. Pardon?! Why are they responsible? Both Nasrallah [Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah] and Abu Mazen [Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas] owe us nothing. We demanded nothing of them before we withdrew and they promised us nothing.
COMMENT IN ISRAEL'S JERUSALEM POST
Israel has to urgently regain its deterrent, which has been severely eroded by the pullbacks from Lebanon and Gaza. Air strikes coupled with rhetoric are no longer enough. It falls now to Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Defence Minister Amir Peretz to decide whether Israel will retake the upper hand by acting forcefully and smashing Hezbollah with the IDF's full might. They are both fully aware that it is much easier to go into Lebanon than to leave and that they might be playing into Nasrallah's hands. Either way it is an almost impossible choice.
Iran
IRAN'S CONSERVATIVE JAM-E-JAM
The Hezbollah mission in detaining two Israeli soldiers is the continuation of a crisis that the Israelis themselves have triggered in the occupied lands... Hezbollah's reaction can be seen to reinforce the position of the Hamas government while at the same time damaging Israel's security network. Hezbollah's action will have positive repercussions for the Palestinians and Lebanese people, and may even to the departure of Israeli forces from the Shebaa farms.
IRAN'S HARDLINE KAYHAN
The Hezbollah intrusion in the unbalanced Tel Aviv-Gaza equation could change everything for the better for the Palestinians. The Hezbollah intervention will accelerate the process of resolving the Gaza crisis.
IRAN'S CONSERVATIVE RESALAT
Hezbollah has always been ready to respond Israel's atrocities. The Zionist regime is being trapped in a mire from which previous attempts to extricate itself cost it dearly. Hezbollah is ready to inflict more costs on Israel this time.
Regional Arabic
COMMENT IN LONDON-BASED PAN ARAB AL-QUDS AL-ARABI
We cannot understand why some Arab quarters are pressing for the release of the two Israeli soldiers. This is clearly biased towards Israel. UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, one of the most prominent personalities calling for the release of the Israeli soldiers, has not made a single remark on the issue of the thousands of Arabs detained in Israeli prisons.
COMMENT IN SYRIA'S AL-THAWRAH
Five past nine. A very special hour in the work of the resistance which brought much more than just capturing two Israeli soldiers and killing others. It brought with it new meanings, including an insult to the Israeli military arrogance and a message that its weapons arsenal will not protect Israel as long as it continues its aggressions.
EDITORIAL IN JORDAN'S AL-RA'Y
Everybody agrees that the region is approaching a real crossroads following the speedy developments over the past few hours on the Lebanese-Israeli border and the massacres committed by the occupation army in the Gaza Strip.
EDITORIAL IN EGYPT'S AL-JUMHURIYAH
These events are only part of Israel's continuous aggression against Palestinians, Syrians, Lebanese and others, confirming that the oasis of Western democracy in the Middle East is the source of evil and the place where all fires and wars start.
EDITORIAL IN SAUDI ARABIA'S AL-RIYADH
Is this an introduction to a full-scale war between the Arabs and Israel? And if this is true, who is behind the scenes?
BBC Monitoring selects and translates news from radio, television, press, news agencies and the internet from 150 countries in more than 70 languages. It is based in Caversham, UK, and has several bureaux abroad.
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