They have kidnapped foreigners, fired rockets at civilian population centers and carried out suicide bombings. Their ideology calls for the elimination of Israel, and they unashamedly wave the banner of jihad (holy war) against the West.

The Lebanese group Hizbullah has one of the nastiest track records around – but despite it all, Europe still hesitates to label them a “terrorist organization”.

In what must have been a surrealistic scene, Israeli Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom met yesterday with French Foreign Minister Michel Barnier to request that the European Union (EU) add Hizbullah to its list of terrorist organizations.

Incredibly, Barnier demurred, saying that such a move “would have political aspects. Hezbollah has a political party and the entire Lebanese context must be viewed” in the matter.

To his credit, Shalom quickly retorted, “Show me another political party with 12,000 rockets,” leading Barnier to agree to examine the issue ahead of next week's EU session in Brussels to discuss the list of terrorist organizations.

But there really isn’t very much to “examine” – after all, as the French Foreign Minister unwittingly made clear, this is little more than a “political” issue as far as Europe is concerned. The fact that Hizbullah targets Israelis and encourages others to do the same – well, the Europeans have more important things (i.e. commercial interests) to worry about than the killing of innocents.

And so, for all their hyperbole about human rights and international law, Europe remains mired in their own stew of hypocrisy and narrow self-interest.

Qu'un scandale!