Quest for Peace fails in Rome

Looks like we'll have to redouble our efforts and prayers:

ROME - Top U.S. and European officials agreed Wednesday on the need for urgent action to halt the fighting in Lebanon and on the creation of a multinational force to keep the peace.

But the two sides had starkly divergent views of what that means.

Most Europeans want Israel to stop its offensive against Hezbollah now — which would leave Hezbollah battered but defiant. The United States wants to give Israel more time to pound the militia into submission as part of the wider war on terror.

The foreign ministers and other senior officials from 15 nations, as well as U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan and representatives from the European Union and the World Bank agreed in Rome on a declaration that expressed "deep concern" for the high number of civilian casualties in Lebanon, where government officials say hundreds of people have been killed. Israel, Iran and Syria did not attend the meeting.

Deep differences in an approach to the crisis were abundantly clear. [More...]