In past weeks various UN spokespeople have been issuing rare condemnations of Hezbollah’s violations of Resolution 1701. The Special Coordinator for Lebanon, Michael Williams, has said that there were “clearly” violations of the resolution on the part of the organisation; meanwhile Haaretz reports on Alain Le Roy, Under-Secretary-General for Peacekeeping Operations, accusing Hezbollah of maintaining an arms cache in south Lebanon and agitating civilian groups into attacking members of UNIFIL. This will be seen as a highly unusual development by regular UN-watchers, who will be aware of how reluctant UN organs generally are to condemn Hezbollah and Hamas. It seems…