The Finger Perpetually Points at Israel: Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah would not have much to build a base on if he couldn't bank on belligerence--his own toward Israel's, and Israel's unfailing capacity to return the favor. (Salah Malkawi/Getty Images)

While Israel worries about the very real possibility of a third intifada, Hezbollah's Hassan Nasrallah announced in an incendiary speech in Beirut on Monday that Israel may have something else to worry about--Hezbollah's avenging of Israel's assassination in Damascus last month of Imad Mughniyeh, mastermind of many terrorist and military operations against the United States and Israel. "We will choose the time, place and manner of punishment," Nasrallah said.

Nasrallah, characteristically weary of assassination, didn't appear in person, but delivered his speech by way of giant video links in the southern suburbs of Beirut.

It's interesting to compare how the French daily L'Orient-Le Jour reported the story (available by subscription only), compared with the version in Haaretz, the Israeli daily. L'Orient, not a Hezbollah sympathizer by any means, focused on Nasrallah's threat to avenge Mughniyeh. But the paper noted that Nasrallah "downplayed the possibility of a new war with Israel or of a conflict in the region." The paper quoted Nasrallah saying,

I don't eliminate that possibility, but I remind you that Israeli warfare isn't a walk in the park anymore. It's a costly decision that (Israeli) authorities cannot take lightly anymore. It's not simple for the United States to lead a war on Iran, or for Israel to wage war on Syria or Lebanon, because the situation before the war of July 2006 isn't like the situation after the war of 2006.

Only then does L'Orient note that Nasrallah said, somewhat dubiously, that "a majority of Lebanese support a struggle envisioning the elimination of Israel." But Nasrallah cautioned, "That doesn't mean that we'll open a front on the southern border with Israel to defeat that Zionist regime. That responsibility doesn't belong to Lebanon, and we don't pretend that it does." And he noted, for good measure, continuing negotiations with Israel to secure a prisoner exchange between the two Israeli soldiers Hezbollah captured just before the 2006 war and many hezbollah operatives and Lebanese civilians in Israeli jails.

Haaretz focused on the more flammable aspects of Nasrallah's speech, leading with his assertion that "the Zionist entity" (as Hezbollah and various Arab regimes prefer, derisively, to refer to Israel) can be wiped out of existence." Haaretz's version relates Nasrallah's rote accusations of "Zionist-American propaganda" downplaying Hezbollah's power and overplaying Israel's. "Can Israel be eliminated? Yes and a thousand yeses, Israel can be eliminated," Hezbollah is quoted as saying. No word, in that version, of Nasrallah begging off another war with Israel or mentioning negotiations over an eventual prisoner exchange.

The Jerusalem Post's version also differs in some regards: Just a few examples of how in the Middle East, the words and the translations, let alone the interpretations, stemming from a single event can be perceived very differently. No wonder the West sometimes shrugs and gives up.