Israeli military strategy is a short term failure, and a long term disaster.
Submitted by James Mitchem on August 5, 2006 - 10:25pm.
bush | Hezbollah | Israel | lebanon | Mid East Crisis 2006. | International
Success and failure in any military operation is based upon the ability of an action to achieve it's objectives, Israel set out almost a month ago to degrade and destroy Hezbollah, get back it’s soldiers, and kill Hassan Nasrallah. In every objective it set it has failed abysmally, Israeli officials speak of degrading the infrastructure of Hezbollah. But the infrastructure of Hezbollah remains largely intact, the ability of Hezbollah to continue fighting is a testament to the resiliency of the organization. Hezbollah will not be pushed back to the Litani River for at least a month, and as Hezbollah is pushed north Israel’s supply lines will grow longer as Hezbollah supply lines grow shorter. Israel will have more land it has to defend and Hezbollah will be able to concentrate it’s efforts.
Sooner or later this war will either end in a cease fire or an expansion of the conflict, in the case of an expansion we are likely to become involved. But even if it should come to a ceasefire Hezbollah has scored a major victory, Hezbollah is cheered by Shia and Sunni alike, it has gained street credibility with every militant Islamic organization in the region. Israel is left to appear weak where Hezbollah appears strong, an how will the people of Lebanon remember this war. Israel has brought the sword, nothing more. As the people of Lebanon rebuild their country they will do so in mind with the fact that Israel destroyed everything they are rebuilding, and that we the United States supplied them with the means to do so.
People in Lebanon may remember that Hezbollah started this, that Hezbollah had the opportunity to end the blood shed, but it is more that they will remember fleeing the ruins of their village. It is more likely that they will remember their dead loved ones killed by Israeli bombs. it is more likely they will remember starving and receiving food and medicine from Hezbollah. It is more likely they will remember hiding in Syria for a lack of any other safe place to go.
Wars are won or lost in the will to fight them. Israel may kill a few thousand fighters and destroy several thousand missiles and drive Hezbollah across the Litani River. But Hezbollah has gained far more. For every fighter it has lost it will gain ten more, this is evidenced by the massive showing of support in Baghdad, in Saudi Arabia, in Egypt and in Iran. And the moderates have become the laughing stock of the Arab world, viewed as weak and unable to defend their populations from what is viewed rightly or wrongly in the Middle East as an act of Israeli aggression, in the end it is the perception that counts.
Hezbollah will become more powerful for having fought this war. It’s ranks will swell with recruits from across the Middle East, it’s popularity will increase. Money will pour in from radical mosques across the Middle East and Hezbollah will be able to buy new and better rockets, advanced anti tank missile systems. The victory belongs to Hezbollah because Israel failed the basic principles of modern military doctrine, and because Hezbollah knew Israel’s weaknesses, and exploited them masterfully.
At this point I don’t see a way for Israel to get a political victory out of it’s hard fought military campaign, due to it’s misuse of force Israel has driven the Lebanese people into the arms of Hezbollah. Hezbollah will be almost impossible to remove from the Lebanese government now, it’s even possible that Hezbollah may win a majority in the Lebanese Parliament. And Hezbollah militants will move north of the Litani River and form new bases of operation and wait for the day when the peacekeepers withdraw from the south which sooner or later they will.
The question now is, are our leaders willing to stand behind the failed policy of Israel despite how disastrous for our interest and ultimately Israel’s interest this campaign is. Or will we say that enough is enough and call on Israel to take the first step towards de-escalation and a cease fire. It is in Israel’s interest to end the fighting now and regroup, if it has to go north again it will know better than to send a weak force against a strong entrenched guerrilla movement, it make sense to fall back and rethink the strategy, and this time Israel would be able to give all civilians the chance to leave, and could then proceed to do whatever it takes to destroy Hezbollah.
It is in Hezbollah’s interest to have a long and protracted fight that will humiliate Israel and destroy Lebanon‘s moderate government, Hezbollah will continue to fight as long as Israel does. Israel will lose face somewhat by withdrawing now, but it is better than losing face by fighting Hezbollah for two months and only managing to push them to the Litani River, the message that sends to the radical elements of the Arab world is that Israel is weak.
The statements I've seen from Hizbullah are that they won't stop fighting until Israel leaves Lebanon. Not an ideal response but since I don't think Israel wants to stay in Lebanon it may not be a deal breaker, in the long run.
Despite some reports that I've seen the UN resolution does say that Israel must leave Lebanon. It doesn't mention Israel or Hizbullah by name but it seems clear to me.
the establishment between the Blue Line and the Litani river of an area free of any armed personnel, assets and weapons other than those of the Lebanese armed and security forces and of UN mandated international forces deployed in this area; UN Draft Resolution
Barry
Are you safer today than you were five years ago?
Israel has agreed to the current UN force there now monitoring the cease fire and the PM of Lebanon is ok with doing this in 2 stages, allowing the cease fire and then France will send in some 2,000 troops to support the current UN force under a French general and then Israel can go home. Then the second part has to include the disarming of Hizbullah and turning their weapons over to the Lebanese military, return of refugees, etc...
I did check Haaretz, that's where I found the text of the UN resolution. :)
Since some of the statements from politicians and reporters are starting to sound like "which came first, the chicken or the egg?" I wanted to read the resolution for myself. As Clark said today there's no trust between the parties here (for good reason). Its not realistic to expect Hizbullah to say "cool, Israel's going home where do we turn in our guns?" And its equally unrealistic to expect Israel to head home based on just a piece of paper.
Barry
Are you safer today than you were five years ago?
We'll see if they stop offensive military operations...
As for Hezbollah, as I said above it is in their interest to continue fighting unless Israel complies with their demands. It isn't right, it is not moral, it is not in the best interest of the people of Lebanon, but it is the way Hezbollah works.
Nasrallah is a bully, he isn't interested in peace unless he feels it puts him in a stronger position. So it's going to have to be Israel that makes the first gesture towards peace
Unless of course we are going to get our heads out of the sand and send Condi to Damascus to talk to Assad.
Look I don't think anyone is on Hezbollah's side here, I think all Clarkies can agree that Hezbollah is wrong in all of this. They should have given back the soldiers long ago and prevented all of this needless bloodshed, they shouldn't have kidnapped them in the first place.
But terrorists will be terrorists, and it is up to civilized people to make the first step towards peace and end the bloodshed.
Blanket bombing, resulting in a 5:1 kill ratio of civilians to militants is no less terrifying, no matter which side uses it.
"But terrorists will be terrorists, and it is up to civilized people to make the first step towards peace and end the bloodshed."
Can somebody PLEASE cut and paste that quote on
to every billboard in America and then make
the Bush Administration and Israel write it on a
chalkboard 100000000000 times!!!!
...has also cited Israel for numerous human rights violations including the West Bank separation barrier
"Even in its first phase, the barrier is taking a terrible toll on tens of thousands of people," said Joe Stork, acting executive director of the Middle East and North Africa division of Human Rights Watch. "President Bush should ensure that the U.S. government does its utmost to prevent these serious violations of international law
there's a pretty long list, but here's another...
(Jerusalem, April 29, 2003) -- The Israeli army should immediately stop using U.S.-supplied flechette shells in the Gaza Strip, Human Rights Watch said today. The use of such antipersonnel weapons in densely populated areas makes the risk of civilian casualties intolerably high under international law.
Flechettes are razor-sharp 3.75mm darts released from canisters that explode in mid-air and spray thousands of them in an arc some 300 meters long and 90 meters wide. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) generally fires them in 105 mm tank shells. According to Jane’s Defence Weekly, the IDF is using a modified version of US-supplied M494 105mm APERS-T rounds, acquired in the 1970s.
Their wide “kill radius” renders flechettes particularly deadly. Their use in heavily populated areas contravenes two basic principles of the laws of war. The first is the prohibition against indiscriminate attacks, which means that forces cannot use weapons or mount attacks that do not or cannot distinguish between civilians and military objectives
In a report issued on August 3, “Fatal Strikes: Israel’s Indiscriminate Attacks Against Civilians in Lebanon,” Human Rights Watch documented a systematic failure by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) to distinguish between combatants and civilians. In some cases, the timing and intensity of the attack, the absence of a military target, as well as subsequent strikes on rescuers, suggest that Israeli forces deliberately targeted civilians. Yesterday, Israeli bombing reportedly killed at least 40 civilians in Lebanon.
Also, the argument that IDF targets Hezbollah militants who "are attacking" (present tense intended) Israel from civilian residences is somewhat misleading:
Katyusha rockets are launched from trucks,... hence, these are mobile platforms. In 30 seconds they're gone. Therefore, when , Israel bombs the site 30 minutes later, they simply won't be there - other than civilian targets. This is primarily why militarily, Israels' strategy against Hexbollah has been severely flawed and justifies the public outrage. The civilian:militant kill ratio is not only disproportionate, but criminal in my view.
Hezbollah militants are no less criminal in this context. If it had hoped to claim any legitimacy as a resistence movement, it should have aimed its rockets at IDFs, not Israeli civilians. Israel, as a nation state, has the moral imperative to recognize this distinction. Instead, it forces have resorted to similar retaliatory tactics against civilians that's structured on revenge -- but an eye for an 10 eyes.
Not all of these rockets are launched from trucks, but it would be really rare to launch one from a building.
"Katyusha" has been generally used to refer to a family of rockets. Now it seems that "Katyusha" means any rocket fired by Hizbullah! The 122mm rocket has a shorter range and many of them have been fired into the towns along the border. This does not require a truck of much of anything to fire. A timer can easily be rigged so that those firing the rocket are long gone by the time it launches. With these there is no target for the air force.
Barry
Are you safer today than you were five years ago?
GlobalSecurity.org has very good info on Hizbollah (w/updates) - pronounced "Hizb-Allah"
Site: http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/para/hizballah.htm
It adds that its movement is refered to as;
- Party of God
- Islamic Jihad
- Islamic Jihad for the Liberation of Palestine
- Organization of the Oppressed on Earth
- Revolutionary Justice Organization
Last month I checked out this site for reference on "Hizbollah." The site's been updated since, but it had refered to the "Hizbollah" and "Hezbollah," interchangeably throughout its text. However, the former term was generally used to define its political arm; while the latter term its militant arm.
Now it's been updated, and a bit more consistent with using "Hizbollah", but "Hizballah" seems to refer to its militant arm.
It be nice if someone here could explain how to ascribe the appropriate terms of this organization: "Hizballah / Hizbollah / Hizbullah / Hezbollah"
Arabic doesn't use the European alphabet. If you have an up to date browser it shows up on pages like Al Arabiya. Like Hebrew its read right to left, and that's the limit of my knowledge on the subject. :)
But the various spellings are certainly due to the transliteration required to write them in European characters. There may be multiple systems for doing that.
Barry
Are you safer today than you were five years ago?
today was much bigger than the other Katushas. Interesting that it happened on the same day Syria says their military is standing ready and they don't approve of the UN ceasefire resolution. Of course much of the leadership of Hizbullah is in Syria.
The 50-page report, "Fatal Strikes: Israel's Indiscriminate Attacks Against Civilians in Lebanon," detailed nearly two dozen cases of IDF attacks in which a total of 153 civilians, including 63 children, were killed in homes or motor vehicles. http://hrw.org/reports/2006/lebanon0806/
Neither side is blameless.
To be fair again, the thing Hizbullah is cited for (sending the rockets into Israel at civilian targets) has been going on for years. I suspect, should Israel have to present evidence to anybody to defend their strikes, they will be able to show why they struck those places from a military perspective and that they did warn the civilian population to leave before striking. I realize it may seem like not enough, but then again, there is a difference.
No one excuses Hezbollah's targeting of civilians. But to be fair, both sides are guilty of war crimes.
Peter Bouckaert, Emergencies Director at Human Rights Watch, wrote on July 31:
In Iraq, US bombs often hit civilian homes, hours after Saddam Hussein or members of his inner circle had left, missing their legitimate targets but killing civilians. In Lebanon it is a very different picture. Time after time, Israel strikes at civilian homes and civilian vehicles attempting to flee the besieged southern border zone, killing families without any military objective in sight.
In an extraordinary, and extraordinarily revealing comment, the Israeli Justice Minister, Haim Ramon, reportedly said, "All those now in south Lebanon are terrorists who are related in some way to Hezbollah." So if you take to the roads to flee, you are a terrorist - who else would travel the southern roads now? And, if you stay at home because the danger is so great, you are also a terrorist. For the innocent civilian, there is literally no way out...
When the Israelis dropped leaflets instructing all villages south of the Litani River to evacuate immediately "for your own safety," Manal and dozens of her neighbors set off in three cars, waving white flags. As they left, an Israeli warplane dropped bombs 10 meters in front of and behind the convoy, which raced on. As far too many Lebanese civilians have found, Manal's experience is not exceptional, on the contrary...
Although mistakes are made in the fog of fighting, the pattern of Israeli behavior in southern Lebanon suggests a deliberate policy. My notebook overflows with reports of civilian deaths, day after day.
Israel blames Hezbollah for the massive civilian toll in Lebanon, claiming that they are hiding the rockets they are firing at Israel, in civilian homes, and that they are fighting from within the civilian population. This is a convenient excuse. Human Rights Watch has consistently documented Hezbollah's war crimes, including deliberate and indiscriminate attacks on Israeli civilians, as well as the taking of hostages. But our investigations have not found evidence to support Israeli allegations that Hezbollah are intentionally endangering Lebanese civilians by systematically fighting from civilian positions. We can't exclude the possibility that it happens - but time and again villagers tell us that Hezbollah is fighting from the hills. Meanwhile, the homes hit by Israel have only civilians in them.
The current Israeli actions are not only wrong, but - short of compelling evidence to the contrary, which so far is nowhere to be found - also war crimes. Israel's leaders, and their friends elsewhere in the world, must face up to that truth.
Human Rights Watch can make the allegation that war crimes were commited. Then someone like the court at the Hague or wherever looks at the evidence. The same allegations were made after the war over Kosovo. The Serbs still are screaming about this and pointing their finger at Wes. The authorities looked at all the evidence and determined what one side charged were war crimes actually were not when looking at the evidence. In this action, it's the same situation. People with the expertise to weigh the evidence will be the ones to decide, not Human Rights Watch or any of the rest of us. I'm really glad the USA was found to be in the clear on that charge regarding Serbia, aren't you? We can't pass the smell test over Iraq, can we?
CIA Soros attacks Lebanese resistance
por FPF - Henk Ruyssenaars Sunday, Aug. 06, 2006 at 7:23 AM
...and they're calling him "Human Rights Watch" from the other side. So who's your expert seems to be the question...and I'm really quite sorry they too, drug Wes into it in this manner, but then I suppose that is to be expected. It seems both sides simply will shamelessly make a pawn of Wes Clark.
In the end tho, I think there is no real justification for any of this.
What would you do for a Klondike Bar?
in the writing on this site. Wes gets dragged into it, because allegations were made and the finding was there were no war crimes. In Kissinger's case, I don't know that there's ever been a hearing or determination, the same with the others on the list. Wes is unique in that as an American, "they" considered the charge and he was cleared of the charge.
I just read in The Guardian that Iran wants Israel tried forwar crimes on Lebanon. They want Bush and Blair tried as well as accomplices. They are also threatening the use of the "oil weapon" should sanctions be placed on Iran over the nuclear thing. They are saying people shouldn't shiver from the cold this winter in Europe and such. Seemed like a cue to get off foreign fossil fuel if I ever saw one. Somehow, I think China and Russia would have to deal with Iran on that point as they are the big business partners with them. To not let China have the oil and natural gas they need seems like biting the hand that feeds. Russia has their own oil and natural gas.
http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=2928 (via Juan Cole's site)
Down the Memory Hole
Israeli contribution to conflict is forgotten by leading papers
7/28/06
In the wake of the most serious outbreak of Israeli/Arab violence in years, three leading U.S. papers—the Washington Post, New York Times and Los Angeles Times—have each strongly editorialized that Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon were solely responsible for sparking violence, and that the Israeli military response was predictable and unavoidable. These editorials ignored recent events that indicate a much more complicated situation.
Beginning with the Israeli attack on Gaza, a New York Times editorial (6/29/06) headlined "Hamas Provokes a Fight" declared that "the responsibility for this latest escalation rests squarely with Hamas," and that "an Israeli military response was inevitable." The paper (7/15/06) was similarly sure in its assignment of blame after the fighting spread to Lebanon: "It is important to be clear about not only who is responsible for the latest outbreak, but who stands to gain most from its continued escalation. Both questions have the same answer: Hamas and Hezbollah."
The Washington Post (7/14/06) agreed, writing that "Hezbollah and its backers have instigated the current fighting and should be held responsible for the consequences." The L.A. Times (7/14/06) likewise wrote that "in both cases Israel was provoked." Three days and scores of civilian deaths later, the Times (7/17/06) was even more direct: "Make no mistake about it: Responsibility for the escalating carnage in Lebanon and northern Israel lies with one side...and that is Hezbollah."
As FAIR noted in a recent Action Alert (7/19/06), the portrayal of Israel as the innocent victim in the Gaza conflict is hard to square with the death toll in the months leading up to the current crisis; between September 2005 and June 2006, 144 Palestinians in Gaza were killed by Israeli forces, according to a list compiled by the Israeli human rights group B'tselem; 29 of those killed were children. During the same period, no Israelis were killed as a result of violence from Gaza.
In a July 21 CounterPunch column, Alexander Cockburn highlighted some of the violent incidents that have dropped out of the media’s collective memory:
Let's go on a brief excursion into pre-history. I’m talking about June 20, 2006, when Israeli aircraft fired at least one missile at a car in an attempted extrajudicial assassination attempt on a road between Jabalya and Gaza City. The missile missed the car. Instead it killed three Palestinian children and wounded 15.
Back we go again to June 13, 2006. Israeli aircraft fired missiles at a van in another attempted extrajudicial assassination. The successive barrages killed nine innocent Palestinians.
Now we're really in the dark ages, reaching far, far back to June 9, 2006, when Israel shelled a beach in Beit Lahiya killing eight civilians and injuring 32.
That's just a brief trip down Memory Lane, and we trip over the bodies of twenty dead and forty-seven wounded, all of them Palestinians, most of them women and children.
On June 24, the day before Hamas' cross-border raid, Israel made an incursion of its own, capturing two Palestinians that it said were members of Hamas (something Hamas denied—L.A. Times, 6/25/06). This incident received far less coverage in U.S. media than the subsequent seizure of the Israeli soldier; the few papers that covered it mostly dismissed it in a one-paragraph brief (e.g., Chicago Tribune, 6/25/06), while the Israeli taken prisoner got front-page headlines all over the world. It's likely that most Gazans don’t share U.S. news outlets' apparent sense that captured Israelis are far more interesting or important than captured Palestinians.
The situation in Lebanon is also more complicated than its portrayal in U.S. media, with the roots of the current crisis extending well before the July 12 capture of two Israeli soldiers by Hezbollah. A major incident fueling the latest cycle of violence was a May 26, 2006 car bombing in Sidon, Lebanon, that killed a senior official of Islamic Jihad, a Palestinian group allied with Hezbollah. Lebanon later arrested a suspect, Mahmoud Rafeh, whom Lebanese authorities claimed had confessed to carrying out the assassination on behalf of Mossad (London Times, 6/17/06).
Israel denied involvement with the bombing, but even some Israelis are skeptical. "If it turns out this operation was effectively carried out by Mossad or another Israeli secret service," wrote Yediot Aharonot, Israel’s top-selling daily (6/16/06; cited in AFP, 6/16/06), "an outsider from the intelligence world should be appointed to know whether it was worth it and whether it lays groups open to risk."
In Lebanon, Israel's culpability was taken as a given. "The Israelis, in hitting Islamic Jihad, knew they would get Hezbollah involved too," Amal Saad-Ghorayeb, a professor at Beirut’s Lebanese American University, told the New York Times (5/29/06). "The Israelis had to be aware that if they assassinated this guy they would get a response."
And, indeed, on May 28, Lebanese militants in Hezbollah-controlled territory fired Katyusha rockets at a military vehicle and a military base inside Israel. Israel responded with airstrikes against Palestinian camps deep inside Lebanon, which in turn were met by Hezbollah rocket and mortar attacks on more Israeli military bases, which prompted further Israeli airstrikes and "a steady artillery barrage at suspected Hezbollah positions" (New York Times, 5/29/06). Gen. Udi Adam, the commander of Israel’s northern forces, boasted that "our response was the harshest and most severe since the withdrawal" of Israeli troops from Lebanon in 2000 (Chicago Tribune, 5/29/06).
This intense fighting was the prelude to the all-out warfare that began on July 12, portrayed in U.S. media as beginning with an attack out of the blue by Hezbollah. While Hezbollah's capture of two Israeli soldiers may have reignited the smoldering conflict, the Israeli air campaign that followed was not a spontaneous reaction to aggression but a well-planned operation that was years in the making.
"Of all of Israel’s wars since 1948, this was the one for which Israel was most prepared," Gerald Steinberg, a political science professor at Israel's Bar-Ilan University, told the San Francisco Chronicle (7/21/05). "By 2004, the military campaign scheduled to last about three weeks that we’re seeing now had already been blocked out and, in the last year or two, it’s been simulated and rehearsed across the board." The Chronicle reported that a "senior Israeli army officer" has been giving PowerPoint presentations for more than a year to "U.S. and other diplomats, journalists and think tanks" outlining the coming war with Lebanon, explaining that a combination of air and ground forces would target Hezbollah and "transportation and communication arteries."
Which raises a question: If journalists have been told by Israel for more than a year that a war was coming, why are they pretending that it all started on July 12? By truncating the cause-and-effect timelines of both the Gaza and Lebanon conflicts, editorial boards at major U.S. dailies gravely oversimplify the decidedly more complex nature of the facts on the ground.
Here's to us all...
LindaG
http://www.juancole.com/2006/08/save-lebanese-civilians-faleh.html
Save Lebanese Civilians
Faleh A. Jabar, an Iraqi intellectual resident in Beirut who has been a leading force in promoting a democratic intellectual culture in Iraq, writes from Lebanon:
Dear All:
This situation in Lebanon is going from bad to worst. Innocent lives are being shattered and threatened in mass.
I need to ask you and other colleagues in the academia to launch a campaign to pressure the US to stop Israeli destruction of bridges, power stations, and end the Israeli blockade to Lebanon. Fuel is running short, and hospitals will come to a stand still, water supplies will be cut short, a total human disaster. Israel's official target is to secure Hizbollah-free south, not to starve four millions and randoumly threaten the lives of all civilians.
I am sixty years old this year, and my life does not matter that much; but I look at the young and shudder: I have young neighbours who need kidney-wash every 48 hours, and there are children with cancer, lot with heart diseases. Cutting power supply means a death sentence to them.
May I add that doctors in Beirut advised that the fate of more than 20,000 patients is at stake. Pregnant women will most certainly suffer. Their numbers are anybody's guess. There are two tankers waiting offshore for Israeli guarantees to no avail. They carry fuel supplies to power plants and vehicles, some 20 odd days.
This is horrible and unbearable. Please do something. Send letters to the UN, EU, the White House, the International Red Cross. This is urgent.
Faleh A. Jabar '
See here for how to send money to the American University in Beirut Hospital for relief efforts.
You can write your political representatives at Congress.org
Here's to us all...
LindaG
...I wish I could find the Daily Kos diary that outlined why
they should have done nothing.
Would it be correct to say that if Israel had just told the 2 captured soldiers "Buh-bye" then aside from losing those 2 this whole thing would have been nipped in the bud cuz H would know that it's futile to try to coerce Israel with hostages?
of the agreement the US and France put together for the UN. The PM of Lebanon has said they can agree to working with it in 2 stages. It's Hizbullah who won't stop the fighting and BTW, Human Rights Watch has now said all the rockets Hizbullah have been firing into Israel(and have for years) are clear war crimes violations. Syria really needs to get Hizbullah to agree with the Lebanese PM. One way or another, they will probably get Israel to give up Sheba Farms, which is what they want.