When it was initially announced, the cease-fire with Hezbollah via the Lebanese government, to which Israel acquiesced on Tuesday, didn’t make much sense to me. Why would Jerusalem agree to put a halt to the war it was prosecuting so expertly with only some of its objectives secured and in response to security guarantees that look a lot like the failed architecture of the past? Now we know. Israel wasn’t persuaded to take a risk on peace. The Jewish state was blackmailed into it.