Seeing the world through Peretz's eyes

Ever wish you could? Amir Peretz's long career has taken him to the top of Israeli politics, where he finds himself increasingly loathed and ridiculed. The former is justifiable; the latter, not so much.

Danger Room, the new national security blog from Wired, just posted a great introduction to the man and why he (still) is where he is, explaining some of the idiosyncrasies of the Israeli political system in the process. It discusses party politics, national defense myths, and race; for the interested but uninitiated, the post is worth a read.

Here's my take on it, with a couple of links thrown in to my own writing (I'm really into crossposting these days).

There's nothing wrong, and certainly nothing ridiculous, about a civilian leading the defense ministry. In fact, it was positively refreshing to see a man like Peretz assume that role: witness my own excitement in this November 2005 Security Watch article. What is worthy of contempt, however, is taking the job for all the wrong reasons and breaking all your election promises, and it took exactly 12 months (and a catastrophic war) for the world to figure that out, and me to write another article.

Read if you want, and judge for yourself how symbolic the photo is.