It's pretty obvious to everyone that Israel lost its war against Hezbollah -- the Israelis know it, and the Lebanese know it. This is a disgraceful turn of events for Israel, and for the whole of Western Civilization. On the part of the Israeli public:
The 34-day war against Lebanese Hezbollah guerrillas, widely seen here as just, had united Israel's fractured society. Hezbollah was considered a growing threat after it had vastly expanded its arsenal of missiles in recent years.But the unity crumbled after Israel's fabled army pulled out of south Lebanon without crushing Hezbollah or rescuing two soldiers whose July 12 capture by the guerillas during a raid in Israel triggered the fighting. ...
The Dahaf poll, which had a margin of error of 4.5 percentage points, showed 70 percent opposed to a cease-fire that did not include the return of the captured soldiers, and 69 percent backing an official inquiry into the war's prosecution.
It's disgusting to me that Israel agreed to a cease-fire that didn't regain the freedom of its captured soldiers. Pathetic and ridiculous. What's more, no one believes that a UN multinational force will be able to disarm Hezbollah or secure Israel's northern border. There's no way to view the situation as anything other than a complete victory for Hezbollah and Iran... and they know it.
As stunned Lebanese returned Tuesday over broken roads to shattered apartments in the south, it increasingly seemed that the beneficiary of the destruction was most likely to be Hezbollah.A major reason — in addition to its hard-won reputation as the only Arab force that fought Israel to a standstill — is that it is already dominating the efforts to rebuild with a torrent of money from oil-rich Iran.
Nehme Y. Tohme, a member of Parliament from the anti-Syrian reform bloc and the country’s minister for the displaced, said he had been told by Hezbollah officials that when the shooting stopped, Iran would provide Hezbollah with an "unlimited budget" for reconstruction.
In his victory speech on Monday night, Hezbollah’s leader, Sheik Hassan Nasrallah, offered money for "decent and suitable furniture" and a year’s rent on a house to any Lebanese who lost his home in the month-long war.
"Completing the victory," he said, "can come with reconstruction."
Thereby entrenching Hezbollah (and Iran) in the Lebanese government and further empowering the very group that Israel ostensibly wanted to destroy. The whole war was a debacle for Israel and a complete win for Islamofascism.
However, the far more knowledgable Austin Bay sees it differently.
The Israeli strategy appears to be to allow the UN deal to self-destruct. If the UN peacekeepers can disarm Hizbollah, fine. If not, Israeli ground troops will come back in and clear everyone out of southern Lebanon. At that point, it will be obvious that no one else is willing, or able, to deal with the outlaw "state-within-a-state" that Hizbollah represents. Hizbollah will still exist after being thrown out of southern Lebanon, and it will be up to the majority of Lebanese, and the rest of the Arab world, to deal with Hizbollah and radical Shias.
Eh, I don't know... I think Mr. Bay is a little optimistic.
I would like to think Mr. Bay is correct, but I'm dubious. The notion that just *one more* demonstration of the uselessness of the international community in defending Israel's security will somehow change things is simply bizarre.
Iran's about to go on gasoline rationing in September. Rebuilding Lebanon is going to be a pretty big drain on the treasury while Iranians suffer at the pumps. That's got to be somewhat risky.
I wonder why Bay thinks this UN deal is different than any other. Its pretty scary to me that Israel has backed down-- that we aren't backing them-- that the world will not back them.
How entrenched through the world do these people need to become before we draw the line? BTW have you been reading the stuff about Dearborn MI?
The obvious is sometimes too obvious. Better check out Rostov's Retreat.
Dearborn? You mean those nice little entrepreneurs burning up $3 gas all over the Midwest to make a $4 profit on 100 phones? Yea, that makes sense to me. NOT!
Round trip from Ohio to the Mackinac Bridge is about 1,000 miles. That's about $150 in gas alone.
Has Dearborn been turned into Grozny yet?
RG: I've read a little, mostly about cell phones recently.
ISRAEL LOSES - check your measurment perspective.
Yep, one might think just that. Many Israelis feel we lost, considering the Hizballah (that's the correct spelling) wasn't "crushed" and the 2 kidnapped soldiers were not retirieved. However yet, the Israeli laymen, just like their foreign counterpart (even the educated ones) fail to see the greater picture. Geoplitically and strategically speaking, this was a success. First and foremost, it gave Israel, and the rest of the world who cares to know, a 1-on-1 experience on what the Hizballah can and cannot do. It put their threats to the test, and lo and behold - they CANNOT reach Tel Aviv with rockets, they CANNOT crumble the Israeli cities with artillery, they DO NOT get the support of locals in Lebanon, and when they were busy fighting, anti-Hizballah voices in Lebanon were publicly raised to be heard in the local media and government. Their military propaganda proved overrated, and guess what? Iran REALYY doesn't like that! The actual fighting revealed that Iran's outreach (through Hizballah) is far inferior to what they want us to think. For that, and for endangering Hizballah's hold of Lebanon, the Iranian administration is really pissed at Nasrallah, and this guy will keep his head down for a while (and maybe loose it).
Also, the actual damage to Hizballah's infrastructures, both in South Lebanon and in Beirut, is massive, and some Lebanese reporters claim it to be greater then what Israel claims herself.
On the political level, Israel did not choose, or want, that cease fire. To say its "disgusting to see how Israel agreed to the cease fire" is, I'm sorry to say, being blind to the global power play and Israel's relationship with the American administration. It came to the point where the decision was not Israel's to make, but to accept, with the blessing of the US. Note, however, that NO ONE, not even the UN, France or Russia, pressed for that cease fire a moment too soon. They all favored it from day one, but they also gave Israel enough time to crush some the South Lebanon based Hizballah operation, thus "sending" Israel to measure Iran's actual force (of course this aspect has nothing to do with the nuclear issue, though one might wonder). In a sense, everybody was supportive of the military advancement.
As to the UN task force, and Bay's opinion, give me a break. It's a nice, optimistic and mostly childish aspiration, but, well, we all know the rest (and anyway, I'm already runnig too long on my post, and this being my first on this blog, I'll probably be targeted...).
Keep safe, and grow some global perspectives...
AW: I hope no one targets you, I'm always happy to have new readers!
I'm sure you're right about the US pressuring Israel to accept the cease fire, but even before that it seemed that Olmert was less than enthusiastic about using the force necessary to crush Hizballah. He hesitated with the ground invasion, for instance.
see http://www.arabnews.com/?page=1§ion=0&article=82902&d=29&m=8&y=2006