maycocksean said:
I'm sure there will be many to tell me why this scenario is totally unrealistic and impractical and I'm ready to hear those arguments. After all these situations are usually not simple and don't have simple solutions, but this is a start at answering Sting2's challenge--if Israel shouldn't be doing what they're doing now, then what? They HAD to do something, after all.
Thank you for reclaiming the elephant from the closet.
Militarily speaking, I'm with the majority of posters in here--Israel's current approach is highly unlikely to decisively crush Hezbollah as a militia, it's further inflaming the deep regional distrusts that already exist, and it's resulting in unacceptable losses of civilian life and infrastructure, given both the past and present scope of the threat. Politically speaking, though, I'm far more sympathetic to Israeli pessimism about the prospect that any other parties to the situation (in the Middle East or elsewhere) will ever muster up the resolve and resources necessary to disarm Hezbollah and cut its cords to Tehran and Damascus. And I don't share Sherry's optimism that if Israel only fought terrorism and the hostilities underlying it more "effectively," there would be nothing left to fight. Far too many parties involved still categorically refuse to grant Israel's right to exist where it is, and are wholly unwilling to negotiate that point. I also don't think it's valid to analogize Hezbollah to Hamas. Yes, we can and should debate Israel's handling of the occupied territories and Gaza, as well as whether Israel should embrace negotiations with Hamas on the assumption that they'll eventually come around to fully recognizing Israel's right to exist in exchange for autonomy and peace. But if nothing else (and assuming the fundamental goals of the now-crippled "road map" are still alive and breathing somewhere) Hamas
really is based out of what would be the land of the people they claim to speak for, and
really is committed to securing autonomy and a viable state for said people. The same simply cannot be said of Hezbollah. Regardless of their political role as a voice for Lebanese Shiites, as a militia group, they're first and foremost a proxy for Iran and Syria, and if their "soldiers" really had service to Lebanon foremost in their minds, they'd instead join the Lebanese army and push for
that organization to move into
Shebaa farms and confront the IDF there themselves...
if Israel's presence there is really the non-negotiable
casus belli the Lebanese government's response to UN Resolution 1559 made it out to be, UN disagreement that Shebaa was ever Lebanese territory notwithstanding.
The demand that Lebanon disarm Hezbollah is not new: Resolution 1559 (2004) called for full withdrawal of Syria from Lebanon and for the disbanding of all Lebanese militias, especially Hezbollah--to which
the Lebanese government's response was, essentially, "Nyah nyah, let's see you make us," a challenge to which, not exactly surprisingly, the UN has failed to respond, settling instead for a small and toothless "observer" force, and unhelpfully observing that Lebanon is "confessionally divided," making implementation difficult. It took the assassination of the Lebanese PM in early 2005 to galvanize Lebanese opposition to the Syrian occupation enough to force Syria out (and Syria is likely quite pleased that all the current misfortunes next door are distracting the UN from their ongoing investigation into Syria's role in that incident). Following a November 2005 attack in which Hezbollah combined the attempted abduction of 11 IDF soldiers with a Katyusha barrage "distraction," the UN twice reiterated its call for Lebanon to implement the rest of the Resolution, again fruitlessly. (This was not the first time Hezbollah had attempted such things; for example in 2000 they abducted 3 IDF soldiers, for which Israel negotiated, and followed through with, the release of over 400 prisoners detained for security reasons; Hezbollah then returned the 3 soldiers, but as corpses unfortunately. As those of us old enough to remember the Lebanese Civil War probably recall, their track record for returning hostages alive, Jewish or otherwise, is not good. Additionally, if you fold in their past bombing campaigns, they are believed to have killed some 258 Americans and 113 Argentinians, as well as smaller numbers of other nationals.) In January 2006 the UN also called on Syria to stop funneling Iranian transfers of arms and personnel to Hezbollah, and to stop funding Hezbollah and hosting training camps for Hezbollah, Hamas, and Kurdish militants. That didn't happen either: the Baathist regime in Damascus may be happy enough to hand over Sunni extremists who resent Alawite domination of majority-Sunni Syria, but where Shiite extremists are concerned, it's generally more profitable for them to side with Iran.
There was
a very good article in Sunday's
New York Times (registration required) about the nature and scope of Iran's strategic interests in Lebanon, the essential points of which were:
The Islamic Revolution in 1979 was viewed by its clerical leaders as a part of a pan-Muslim movement. Linking up with the Shiite Muslims of southern Lebanon was part of Iran’s efforts to spread its ideological influence. But in building up Hezbollah, the ideological motivation fused with a practical desire to put a force on Israel’s northern border...Iran believed that Israel might pause before attacking it because they would assume Hezbollah would assault the northern border. If Hezbollah emerges weaker, or restrained militarily because of domestic politics, Iran feels it may be more vulnerable.
...If Hezbollah emerges as the primary political force in Lebanon, Arab governments, which have not pressed hard for a cease-fire, may find that in order to deal with Hezbollah they will have to work through Iran..."It is inconceivable for anyone who calls himself a Muslim and who heads an Islamic state to maintain relations under the table with the regime that occupied Jerusalem,” said President Ahmadinejad in an interview on Iranian television this week, in a clear dig against governments like [Egypt's, Jordan's and Saudi Arabia's]. "He cannot take pleasure in the killing of Muslims yet present himself as a Muslim. This is inconceivable, and must be exposed. Allah willing, it will."
By most current estimates, Iran gives Hezbollah roughly $200 million per year (in addition to arms shipments), as well as an additional $15 million for Hezbollah's Beirut-based
al-Manar TV station (owing to the circumstances, the link may or may not be active; it was yesterday, but isn't as I type this). However Iran is not thought to host as many Hezbollah training camps as Lebanon and Syria do, perhaps for proximity reasons.
Since references to earlier Hezbollah-IDF skirmishes and Katyusha attacks keep coming up, but numbers have not yet been cited (so far as I can tell), here are lists from Israel's Ministry of Foreign Affairs of
border incidents from May 2000-August 2003 and
border incidents resulting in Israeli casualties from May 2000-May 2006. If anyone knows of an analogous Lebanese government source providing similar information from the other side, please post it; I looked, but couldn't find anything.
Because I believe, at this point, that the situation requires a concerted international response, it's easier for me to talk about what Israel
shouldn't do (and what the UN
should), than about what Israel should do and how the UN might facilitate that. What Israel should not do is continue to use conventional warfare tactics against Hezbollah; the costs to Lebanon at large, not to mention Israel's future standing with its neighbors, for long-term Israeli "success" against Hezbollah are and would be simply too high. What the UN should do is pull together not only a peace and reconstruction plan, but also sufficient, combat-ready international forces to help implement it--and that plan must include a *UN* mandate to oversee Hezbollah's disarmament. And that is going to be the big sticking point: Hezbollah MPs have signed on "in principle" to PM Fouad Siniora's Lebanese peace proposal, on the understanding that disarmament talks between the various Lebanese factions will wait until after the UN has announced the composition and mandate of its forces. However, several Hezbollah MPs have already expressly stated that they will not sign on to any disarmament plan which
does not grant sole sovereign authority for ensuring Hezbollah's compliance to the Lebanese government. IMO, such a plan would be virtually guaranteed to fail, which in all likelihood is precisely what Hezbollah--and their friends in Tehran and Damascus--wants.