Lebanese Army to Fight Alongside Hezbollah?

This is not good news if there's a hope of containing the current crisis in Lebanon:

The Lebanese Minister of Defense warned Israel Thursday that if IDF ground forces are sent into southern Lebanon, Lebanese troops will fight along with the Hizbullah against Israel.

If the Lebanese army decides to fight alongside terrorists against Israel, then the Israelis will have no reason whatsoever to withhold the full force of their military power. The Lebanese army will be crushed, and with that will probably come the Syrians who are sure to intervene. The conflict will likely spiral into a regional war with significant loss of life on both sides.

If the Lebanese political and military leadership had any courage at all they would turn against Hezbollah and help Israel clean them out of there. Once Hezbollah was removed, Israel would have no reason to keep a presence in Lebanon and the Lebanese people would have a reasonable shot at living in peace.

With the nutty President of Iran predicting a "major event that will cause the world's Arabs to rejoice" in the next few days, things could get very bad very quickly over there.