BRITAIN: Tony Blair will face his critics today over his controversial handling of the Middle East crisis, insisting that he has been working throughout for a ceasefire in Lebanon and that his position has been misunderstood.
He will argue at a Downing Street press conference that he wanted a ceasefire, but only if it was coupled with a clear understanding that the Hizbullah militia would be disarmed.
Mr Blair, who returned from his US trip yesterday, will say that he is trying to secure a durable settlement rather than a short-term fix which would leave armed militias operating on the border of Israel.
But he has being criticised publicly and privately by ministers and senior backbenchers, and has antagonised most members of the EU as well as the United Nations secretariat.
It emerged yesterday that he ignored not only the advice of the Foreign Office but foreign affairs specialists in Downing Street, who argued that the Israeli offensive was counter-productive and favoured a call for an immediate ceasefire.
Critics inside the Labour Party said Labour MPs were in despair over his handling of the crisis, and a 12-strong group of backbench MPs, including many Muslim MPs, led by Mohammed Sarwar, called for the return of parliament to discuss the crisis.
Joan Ruddock, a former minister, said there was a sense of "despair" within Labour ranks.
"I have not met any member of the Labour Party who actually agrees with our strategy," she told BBC Radio 4's The World At One. "I really can't envisage at the moment how the party conference will go.
" There is enormous anger, disappointment and the sense that there has to be a change of direction, but that the damage has been done."
Mr Blair suffered a blow from an unexpected source yesterday when the UN deputy secretary general, Mark Malloch Brown, urged him to take a back seat, calling his involvement in the negotiations on ending the crisis counter-productive. "It's important to know not just when to lead but when to follow," he said.
The US State Department went to Mr Blair's rescue. Sean McCormack, State Department spokesman, said: "We are seeing a troubling pattern of a high official of the UN who seems to be making it his business to criticise member states and, frankly, with misplaced and misguided criticisms."
Ministers privately conceded yesterday that the crisis had damaged the prime minister. Mr Blair could face more sniping after opting last night to press ahead with his summer family holiday this weekend rather than delaying to help negotiate an end to the conflict.
Mr Blair will also be pressed today to produce substance to back his claim in a foreign policy speech in Los Angeles that a dramatic change was needed in the fight against global terrorism.
He said western nations must commit to building an "alliance of moderation".
"My argument today is this: We will not win the battle against this global extremism unless we win it at the level of values as much as force, unless we show we are even-handed, fair and just in our application of those values to the world."
He said he was urging a dramatic change in the approach by Western nations to the volatile Middle East region, saying greater efforts were needed to engage moderates in the Muslim and Arab world who might work alongside the West against those he described as radical, reactionary Muslims.