A New Thread fot the Current Israel/Palestine/Lebanon mess

i saw some IDF general on CNN at a press conference say that nothing in lebanon was safe.

And nobody did jack shit about it for the most part, including the IDF and the international community. How would, say, France react to Spain launching unprovoked attacks for years while the rest of the world said, "this happens all the time and isn't news, just grin and bear it because we don't want to get involved in this".

-- NoTimeBeforeTime (mbvarkestra197...), July 13th, 2006.

But Barry, I think a much better analogy would be if the ETA launched an attack from the Basque region, which they basically have done a bunch of times.

I'm more beginning to think that Hamas and Hezbollah planned these attacks with the genuine expectation that they could negotiate a prisoner exchange. Otherwise, a "good opportunity" to what?

Also, I do think Olmert wanting to prove his manhood early in his term could be factor (he was seen as kind of a dull moderate and career politician before, no?)

Address security threats with asymmetrical force.

Israel is concerned about the "kidnap a soldier" ploy becoming a common tactic. Also, Israel has probably been waiting for a chance to undermine the Hamas government.

I guess once the ball got rolling, and Hezbollah fired rockets into Israel, the IDF went after Lebannon as well.

Good thing we've got a strong US president to steer us through this (sorry I absolutely could not resist).

Uh, *I* would be. If you're talking about ground troops, at least.

Let's keep ourselves grounded in reality here. Also, I don't really understand your reaction, which seems to stem entirely from the Israeli response.

Last month, we had Iran + Syria sending funds and weapons to terrorist groups who rely on those countries for their continued existance and are essentially obligated to do whatever those parent nations want them to do. Most of the world ignores this situation unless those groups decide to attack Israel. All of this is business as usual, but as soon as Israel decides that they don't feel like waiting around to see if they get attacked that day, it's "WW III"?

I roundly condemn Hizbullah's criminal and stupid attack on Israel and escalation of a crisis that is already harming ordinary Palestinians on a massive scale.

Likewise, the Beirut airport is not in south Lebanon and for the Israelis to bomb it and neighborhoods in south Beirut is a disproportionate use of force. The Israelis are actually talking about causing "pain to the Lebanese." That is despicable.

I mean, attacking soldiers is different than attacking civilians.

once again, i feel a strong wave of "a pox on both your houses" regarding this whole unfolding drama. not helpful, but there you are.

Israel isn't always the victim, that's not my stance (this comment appears to be addressed to me). Saying that Israel is unfairly criticized more than any other country in the world is closer to my stance.

Israel's punishment for having a strong military is to have open season for anyone to attack them whenever they feel like it? Are you allowed to punch me in the face because I have a knife and it would therefore be unfair for me to use it against you?

Where do you think that Middle Eastern nations get their military equipment? Do you think they build everything themselves? The west (and at the time, the Soviets) have a long history of funding every military in the region, including Israel's. Even now, Egypt receives about $1.5 Billion from the US every year, most of which is spent on the military.

To me, the long-range goal of terrorist groups like Al Qaeda is to embroil western nations in a major war in the Middle East with a unified group of Arab nations. That was the point of 9/11 - to provoke a response, not just to kill a bunch of Americans, and we're getting played like a fiddle. Israel might be as well.

I'm NOT saying don't retaliate when someone attacks you, but take the time to consider that someone might be playing rope-a-dope with you, using your strength to further their aims, e.g. if your opponent is of choleric temper, seek to irritate him.

I don't doubt that part of the Bush administration's long term gameplan was to have troops in Iraq so that Iran was, uh, easy to visit, just in case. But things haven't gone as well as planned in Iraq and invading Iran would be a tough sell for a president with approval ratings in the 30s. Axis of evil, here we come!

genius.

xpost

The problem is that the rope-a-dope has been going on for decades, and I'm getting the feeling from the Israeli media that people from across the political spectrum are getting tired of hearing "we're missing an oppurtunity for negotiation" every time Hamas or Hezbollah threatens to destroy the Zionist enemy.

Are you serious? How about just last week, when the UN condemned Israeli actions in Gaza and then decided to form a committee to investigate what was going on there? Um, aren't you supposed to investigate before jumping to conclusions?

I'm not defending innappropriate military actions against the civilians in Beirut or anywhere else, but believe me, Juan Cole will blather on and on about collective punishment on the part of the IDF but won't use the term to describe anything Hamas or Hezbollah does.

http://www.canada.com/topics/news/world/story.html?id=1fe460c8-896b-4305-9e22-5687da508fff&k=69689

It will take several days to mount a full invasion of Lebanon. We would not expect major operations before the weekend at the earliest. If the rocket attacks are taking place, however, Israel might send several brigades to the Litani River almost immediately in order to move the rockets out of range of Haifa. Therefore, we would expect a rapid operation in the next 24-48 hours followed by a larger force later.

At this point, the only thing that can prevent this would be a major intervention by Syria with real guarantees that it would restrain Hezbollah and indications such operations are under way. Syria is the key to a peaceful resolution. Syria must calculate the relative risks, and we expect them to be unwilling to act decisively.

Therefore:

1. Israel cannot tolerate an insurgency on its northern frontier; if there is one, it wants it farther north.

2. It cannot tolerate attacks on Haifa.

3. It cannot endure a crisis of confidence in its military

4. Hezbollah cannot back off of its engagement with Israel.

5. Syria can stop this, but the cost to it stopping it is higher than the cost of letting it go on.

It would appear Israel will invade Lebanon. The global response will be noisy. There will be no substantial international action against Israel. Beirut's tourism and transportation industry, as well as its financial sectors, are very much at risk.

there's no justification for the rocket attacks, but again unless there's something i'm missing, why would anyone in their right mind settle in this part of israel knowing the history?

It's more that if anything it will push the Lebanese government back towards the Syrians.

xpost

or the Lebanese people back to the pro-syrian parties.

Another thought is that syria starts bussing over veterans of Iraq if it (or Assad) feels threatened). Israel should be very reticent about invading southern lebanon it's going to be a lot worse than last time. Terrorist/Geurilla tactics have been taken to another level since the IDF last marched through Lebanon.

no, it isn't.

ihttp://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/maps/is-map.gif

israel is a young country, despite the thousands of years of oppression of the jewish people. i don't see it being quite comparable to the hundreds of years and years of institutional racism and slavery that conjured up the new orleans' milieu. people choose to move to israel. and yeah some people choose to move to new orleans, but a lot of the victims of katrina were people who had never been anywhere else in their lives, and had no way to escape - not to mention a government that would actually evacuate them like the israelis did with gaza.

xpost - i'm not talking about haifa, since afaik that's a new development with the hezbollah's new missle.

Hezbollah having the Katyusha rocket is not a new development at all though. Is there some other *new* missile that I missed in the reports?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thunder_1

The fog of war begins to set in, I guess.

most of which, to be fair, did not take place in the Middle East nor was it instigated by Muslims. Prior to this whole horrible-misapplication-of-a-colonialist/zionist-fuckup Jews had it pretty good in the Middle East, at least compared to how they were treated in Europe.

Jumblatt has been a turncoat for a while, no?

xxxpost: it's all connected & stuff, but yeah, sorry

In any case, you could read that Rumsfeld quote a few different ways. He could have meant "What we need is another attack," but he could have also meant "When the inevitable next attack comes it's going to change people's attitudes." Still makes me a bit queasy though.

oh god, i'm dreading the inevitable emails i'm gonna get from my 9/11 conspiration theory friends...

Since when have the Druze been hardcore?

you mess with them, you dead.