Posted on 08/17/2006 5:33:14 AM PDT by Dark Skies
ISRAEL'S rep for toughness in tatters. Hezbollah trium phant. Iran cockier than ever. Syria untouched. Lebanon's government crippled. An orgy of anti-Semitism in the global media. Anti-Americanism exploding among Iraqi Shi'as inspired by Hezbollah.
Thanks, Prime Minister Olmert. Great job, guy.
The debacle in Lebanon wasn't even a war. It was only round one of a war. And Israel's back in its corner, dazed and punch-drunk.
Israel got in a gut jab, but Hezbollah landed three ferocious haymakers:
* Despite the physical damage the Israeli Defense Forces inflicted, Hezbollah's terror-troops were still standing (and firing rockets) when the bell rang.
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
I'm embarassed for Israel.
PS: Nasrallah and his leaderhip team are still hiding in bunkers somewhere in Lebanon or may be outisde Lebanon, even after 4 days of cease fire.
ISRAEL'S rep for toughness in tatters. Hezbollah trium phant. Iran cockier than ever. Syria untouched. Lebanon's government crippled. An orgy of anti-Semitism in the global media. Anti-Americanism exploding among Iraqi Shi'as inspired by Hezbollah.
Today. Tomorrow?
My point is this is a long war, and there are going to be wins and losses. We won one when the airline plot was uncovered, we lost one with this "cease fire". And Israel WILL be back.
The greatest fear now is what is going to happen inside Lebanon. Will the Lebanese government and other Lebanese factions take advantage of a greatly weakened Hizballah whose fighting force is very badly damaged and whose leadership is hiding in bunkers to put more pressure on Hizballah to fully disarm and renounce terrorism, or will they subdue to fear and get affected with a fake propaganda win for Hizballah and do not do anything to Hizballah for fear of a civil war or fear that they themselves will be killed by the terror militia. Time will tell, but unfortunately the latter looks more probable.
There will be civil war in Lebanon
(one mans opinion, freely given and worth almost that much)
Man do you have a grasp of that situation.
Where is this, Nasrallah the Great !
The Great Leader !
The Great Legend !
Perhaps even ..... The Great Mahdi himself.
Come Nasrallah the Great !
Please tell us how to celebrate your magnificent victory !
Had Israelies known from the beginning that Olmert would have chosen this outcome, they would not have supported the war. They would have demanded what he actually promised: disarming Hezbollah and getting back the two soldiers. This is why Ralph Peters is essentially right.
The part that continues to bother me is our own support of UN resolution 1701. It is not in our national interests for the same reasons that it is bad for Israel. Or, to be more precise, it's terrible for Israel because it is unenforceable and won't be enforced. But this was ultimately Israel's call. If Olmert and the rest of the Israeli government didn't really want to fight, what -- short of entering the conflict ourselves -- could we reasonably have done?
Exactly :)
Didn't aim israel would or wouldn't do it, just that was (at first) a must in this war:
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/739524.html
"The prime minister said that Jerusalem is not ruling out negotiating an end to the crisis provided that the terms of any future deal would rest on the basis of the recent declaration by the Group of Eight industrialized nations, "meaning, the immediate unconditional release of the kidnapped soldiers and the implementation of UN Resolution 1559."
http://story.londonmercury.com/p.x/ct/9/id/a202fb413a3947d7/cid/b8de8e630faf3631/
"Prime Minister Ehud Olmert told a U.N. delegation Tuesday that the disarming of Hezbollah and border security remain conditions of an Israeli cease-fire."
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3276889,00.html
"The Prime Minister’s Office in Jerusalem stated that Israeli was demanding the Lebanese army deploy along the southern border to control Hizbullah. The PMO clarified that they had no intention for an international force be redeployed but Lebanon’s national army.
The statement read: “Resolution 1559 must be upheld, which calls for the Lebanese army to be deployed along the border and Hizbullah to be disarmed. This is our demand.” (Ronny Sofer)"
There are a ton of storeis out there, esp early on the Israel demanded disarmament as a result of this war. Right now, they seem to have lost that. Neither the Lebanese Army of the U.N./French are willing to do this job.
Israel demanded it, but it is not and (in all probability) will not happen. Again, how is this a victory?
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'Disarming' Hezbollha includes decreasing their numbers of armament. That was accomplished. The question here is how much of a decrease will signify a win for Israel. No one ever expected 100 % reductions in armament. At present time only the IDF knows what was destroyed. Everything else is conjecture.
Concerning the soldiers, we do not know what internal communications have occurred. For example, it may had been explained to Israel, in no uncertain terms, that the soldiers are no longer even a viable issue. We do not know.
Perhaps neither Israel nor Hezbollah won, but it is my opinion that Iran is a big loser.
Hizbollah was being counted upon by Iran to be in position to destroy Israel if Iran were attacked. Because of their lack of precision, Hizbollah's rockets proved to be completely inept, few Israelis were killed, and Israel can be less fearful of Hizbollah now that they have been dispersed. Iran thereby loses a huge bargaining chip moving forward in the matter of their nuke program.
Secondly, the Arab world loses vis-a-vis Israel because not only did everyone sit back and let Israel pummel Hizbollah, most Arab countries publicly denounced Hizbollah's initiation of the war. The "enemy of my enemy is my friend" simply was not operative here, and Iran is clearly on their own now.
You are still misrepresenting what they said. Israel did not say that they are going to fight and totally disarm Hizballah. Thy wanted borders security and Lebanese army+ international troops to control South Lebanon from the Litani river to the borders. UN resolution 1701 call for this, and that the buffer zone in the South will be free of Hizballah armed fighters accroding to this resolution. As I said in my original post, 30000 Lebanese and international troops will greatly reduce Hizballah movement in the South and his military presence at a minimum will be very clandestine. Do not expect Hizballah to be able to re-build its military infrasctucture in the South and re-build its destroyed tunnels and destroyed fortifications in the borders towns with Israel.
What's the source of this article?
Well many armed chair generals, political and military analysts, as well as lot of freepers expected this impossible thing or at least very close to it, i.e. over 90% destruction of Hizballah terrorists.
Me.
Their reputation may be, but I bet they aren't.
Put in some good leadership and the Hezbos will become Hazbeens faster than they could imagine.
I don't agree and I hate seeing Israel's policy second guessed in such a negative way.
No, I am saying that the disarmament of Hezbollah was a war aim, whether done by the IDF or soeone else. And yes, I know what res 1701 says, but I think the grave error in all of this is the fanciful assumption that the magical words on paper automatically translate to a reality on the ground. If that were the case, how in the heck did Hezbollah manage to fire so many rockets they didn't have because res 1559 told us they would be disarmed?
Look, we already have news reports of ARMED Hezbollah fighters returning south of the Letani River.
We have quotes by officals in France, Lebanon, and the U.N. all saying that they won't be the ones that disarm Hezbollah.
We know that Hezbollah was able to stockpile and fortify South Lebanon with U.N. troops on the ground watching and no one doing anything about it. And remember, that U.N. froce was commander by the French ... the same French that are supposed to make things better this time?
Exactly.
Israel clearly won, militarily. They won the battles for territory, did more damage to the enemy than was done to them, depleted the enemy weapon's stockpiles, are safer than they were before it started, etc.
Like in Iraq -- there's a "group think" thing going on in the world that says if you don't eliminate every last person on the other side, then you lose.
It amazes me how ignorant people are about war.
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