AbbaGav

Via Haaretz, Ladies and Gentlemen, we have a new French Foreign Minister (FFM) pronouncement:

The French foreign minister on Wednesday called for Israel to lift is air, naval and land blockade of Lebanon, saying it was unnecessary with the UN cease-fire plan holding.

This is great news! I sure hope this one takes a little longer to unravel than the last one, lest we are denied the time mere mortals require to fully appreciate such multi-faceted sagacity, before Nasrallah's reality rudely tramples the fragile beauty of its reasoning.

So let's see if we are up to the task of extracting even a fraction of the exquisitely hidden wisdom subtly encoded in this superficially stupid pronouncement.

We now see minimal missile fire. Which means the cease-fire is holding, more or less. Which means all future problems can now be safely ignored. Hizballah isn't firing that many missiles today, so there is no need to worry about them acquiring more tomorrow. Tres bien.

If we were smart, FFM-level smart, we'd take this logic and use it to make the world a better place by issuing a few calls of our own:

• People should cease the unnecessary brushing of their teeth, immediately. Brushing those places where cavities already occurred is nothing more than brushing your fillings. And the rest of your teeth, the so-far-healthy ones, are obviously impervious to plaque and bacteria anyway, so why waste time and toothbrush on them?
  
• Homeland security must henceforth stop doing security checks on baggage and passengers at airports. Thankfully, the danger has passed, since no plane has been hijacked or blown up in the US in about 5 years. It is most imperative that the counterproductive focus on liquids and gels cease at once, since that plot was already broken up.
  
• You do not need to lock your door when you go out of the house. There are laws against robbery, and police who enforce them, so you are just weakening the communal bonds of trust by locking everyone else out of your house.

I could go on. But I'd rather not.

To be fair the FFM, Philippe Douste-Blazy -- who is not a flammable feminine hygiene product -- believes it is obvious the UN cease-fire plan is enough to obviate the need for Israel to personally prevent Hizballah-bound missile shipments into Lebanon:

"The blockade imposed on the airport and Lebanese ports should be lifted. We ask Israeli authorities to lift the land and sea siege on Lebanon. And we ask the Lebanese government to strengthen monitoring" of points of entry to insure Hezbollah weapons are banned, said Philippe Douste-Blazy.

He understands that he merely needs to call on the Lebanese government to strengthen monitoring, and it will be done. Of course, the monitoring must be strengthened, because up to this exact moment in history it clearly has been insufficient. But from now on it will be different; after all, he just requested it.

Turkish Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul also arrived in Beirut on Wednesday to discuss the deployment of a 15,000-strong international force to south Lebanon, amid doubt over whether Hezbollah would lay down its arms or even withdraw them from the border with Israel.

So there is nothing to worry about and no cause for an embargo. Hizballah doesn't even need new arms, since no one is asking them to lay down the old ones -- at least no one with any sophistication that is. Nasrallah's men certainly don't need any more missiles until they've fired off the ones they've already got. What would they possibly do with yet more missiles with even longer range and larger payloads -- stuff them in a bunker until their expiration dates pass? No, it's a ridiculous thought. Impossible.

I wonder if I couldn't someday be a French Foreign Minister, too, aside from the part about not speaking French.