The Lebanese and the Israelis are similar tribes.

Both have been in the cross hairs of terrorists, Lebanon from within, Israel from without.

While the Muslim world has actively called for the destruction of Israel, it has worked in a more subversive way to undermine the sovereignty of Lebanon. The country, divided among Christians, Druse and Muslims, has been brought to heel by Islamic radicals in league with Syria to transform what was once a symbol of democracy into a puppet of terror-loving Damascus.

And though Syria was forced to remove its military after a popular uprising last year, it is still a malevolent presence in Lebanon.

According to a 2005 State Department report, “Syrian interference in the country continued. Palestinian and Lebanese militias, particularly the terrorist organization Hezbollah, often acted as Syrian proxies and retained significant influence over parts of the country.”

I’ve represented Lebanese Christian asylum-seekers, and they speak with one haunting voice.

Their country has been taken hostage and its leaders massacred by an Islamic overlord that makes them fearful of practicing their religion and unable to recapture the right of self-government. Those who work in cooperation with the terror states, like the militants of Hezbollah, are not accepted by most peace-loving Lebanese.

The anti-Syrian majority in the Lebanese parliament dwarfs those who support Hezbollah, and high-profile marches have been held by Christians and other patriots who want to expunge Islamic terror from their midst. In this, they are like their Israeli neighbors who just want an end to the violence.

Many commentators have criticized Israel for what the European Union has termed a “disproportionate response” to Hezbollah’s capture and murder of Israeli soldiers. Our administration has refused to follow that route.

Lebanese opinion is more nuanced. While understandably angry at the shelling of their cities and the destruction of their infrastructures, those who yearn to be free from the chokehold of Hezbollah have a grudging understanding of why Israel has done what it has, even if they can’t accept the death of civilians.

They know that the “diplomacy” urged by outsiders in the West, like the left-leaning governments of Italy, France and Spain, is an easy concept for those who don’t have the terror beast breathing down their neck.

Israel has lived with that beast for generations. Lebanon smells it in its own backyard and has even opened the door by voting a few Hezbollahites into office.

And now that Iran has re-entered the picture, there is even more of a reason for Hezbollah to be crushed. Most knowledgeable observers feel that the Shiite terror group is a proxy for the mullahs, a back-door way for President Ahmadinejad to fulfill his inaugural promise of destroying Israel, which, as he recently said, “is behaving like Hitler.”

Both Israel and Lebanon understand his true motives, even if the Western powers call the threat a “mistranslation.” Now that Hezbollah has aligned itself with Hamas, the two countries face a threat that matches al-Qaida in ferocity, if not purpose.

As usual, the enemies of Israel blame “the Zionists” for their aggression, and ignore the cause of the problem.

But the facts are simple.

If the architects of terror would be treated as criminals and not given seats at the table with legitimate lawmakers (are you listening, voters of Palestine?), the Lebanese and the Israelis would be able to send their children into the streets without fearing that they might not return home.

If Maronite Christians could worship freely without the jackboot of Islamic Syria on its neck, and if Jews could pray at the Wailing Wall without fearing the rage of a suicide bomber, there would be no need for the shelling.

Hezbollah and Hamas. Syria and Iran. This is the true axis of evil. Only when it is gone can the city on the shimmering hill and its biblical sister live in peace.