The U.N. Security Council as well as the anti-war protesters of the world have spoken and so peace falls upon Iraq – well, at least for now. Last week’s developments will make or break the case against Saddam Hussein’s regime. In a sense, the Security Council has given the Hussein regime enough rope to either hang itself with or rein in all programs involving weapons of mass destruction.

Now if the U.N. can only get Hussein to abandon his ultimate goal, which is to eliminate the state of Israel from the Middle East. Only then will the picture be much rosier than it currently appears.

Throughout his tenure, Hussein’s overt ill intentions toward Israel have been publicized, as was his ambition to be the first Arab nuclear power with the capability to bring Israel to its knees.

It must be stated that any instability in the Middle East will be the result of Iraq drawing Israel into a firefight, thus attracting the ire of the surrounding Arab nations. This is an approach tried during the 1991 Persian Gulf War when Iraq lobbed Scud missiles at Israel. Unfortunately for Iraq, Israel chose restraint and the plan failed. Given the chance, Hussein would try it again with any means available and is currently in progress with the unwitting help of the Palestinians.

Support to the Palestinian cause has been a chief priority of Hussein’s but at the expense of the Palestinians themselves. During the beginning of the Persian Gulf crisis, it was Palestinian guest workers that ushered in the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait and served as agents for Hussein’s army during the Iraqi occupation to ferret out Kuwaiti underground resistance cells.

It is no wonder the Palestinian guest workers were expelled from Kuwait shortly after the war. This backing of Hussein and subsequent expulsion from Kuwait hurt the Palestinian economy in a bad way due to the lost revenue not coming back home.

But this setback doesn’t stop Hussein’s regime from appearing as a savior to the Palestinians and being a thorn in the side of Israel. Financial support of Palestinian suicide bombers and their families remains a major priority for Hussein, and this will go on for as long as he is in power.

In the Palestinians, Hussein sees a ready, willing and able scapegoat that is right next to his life-sworn enemy: the State of Israel. The Palestinians don’t see themselves as pawns, even though their acts only hurt the cause for peace in that region more and more.

If we want to see stability in the Middle East then the toppling of the Hussein regime should not even be considered a moral issue or even a problem. For as long as he stays in power, this tailspin we refer to as the “Middle-East peace process” will get worse as time goes along.

War sucks. But so does allowing a conniving demon such as Hussein to remain in power. We haven’t seen the full impact of his life’s goal simply because Israel maintains itself as the supreme military power within that region, and this has been proven time and again throughout Israel’s existence. But how long can a country live under siege?

Better yet, the real question should be the following: How long before Hussein goes through with his intentions to eradicate Israel?

Israel is a valid state, as are Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Oman, Yemen, Syria, Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Sudan and Quatar. What all these Arab states have in common is the anti-Israel sentiment that runs rampant in those states. What separates them from Iraq is the lack of overt desire to resort to weapons of mass destruction to express that sentiment.

Arab nations will never accept Israel’s existence, and that’s that. What can be affected for the worse is the stability of the region by the ill intentions of one megalomaniac with weapons systems that can reach their target.

That man is Hussein.

Henry Sarria is a long time Isla Vista resident.