on the current situation, cont.
MY THOUGHTS
an email to rim
i've been doing a lot of thinking and worrying, so i want to tell you about it. please tell me your thoughts. this is probably going to come out scattered.
i think nasrallah should be punched in the face. he goes on and on about being such a hardcore lebanese patriot, but this latest initiative is unnecessarily imperiling lebanon and the lebanese for the sake of palestine and the palestinians. there's no way he could have thought that israel would have just let this go. to me, it seems like he literally invited retaliation. i can understand people thinking he is a champion of arab, islamic, shi'a, or palestinian resistance, but, despite what he and his followers did to liberate the south, i cannot believe that he is still working in the best interests of lebanon.
on the other hand, i don't know what israel thinks it's going to get out of this. first of all, i'm skeptical that the idf soldiers will be returned or exchanged. second, i don't think israel's actions will turn any lebanese people against hezbullah and therefore force hezbullah to back down. instead, people who have always supported hezbullah will probably support them more whole-heartedly and, likewise, those who oppose them will become more vehement about it, thus lebanon will become increasingly polarized. more than any of this, though, i think the lebanese people will turn decisively against israel, even those who were previously more conciliatory.
i think israel, as a strong state in which the government has undisputed control over the country, has difficulty understanding that lebanon is a chronically weak state. there has been too much demographic flux and too much bloody history between lebanon's different groups for there to be substantive political unity. hezbullah is a significant force in lebanon -- not just militarily, but politically and socially, as well. as such, lebanon is unable to ignore or eliminate them and many people wouldn't be in favor of those options either. lebanon tried to implement res. 1559, but the demilitarization of hezbullah is impossible without risking the collapse of the government, of which hezbullah is a part. as such, i believed siniora when he said that the government knew nothing about hezbullah's plans and condemned their actions. olmert should believe him, too.
do you remember the paper i wrote for lebanese politics about the palestinians in lebanon between 1969-1975? in it, i concluded that, although the actions of the palestinian guerillas in lebanon were the impetus for the militarization of lebanese politics, the lebanese government was ultimately responsible for failing to control the tensions that ultimately escalated into war. i think that, like israel, i didn't understand state weakness when i was writing the paper. if the government in the early 70s was as weak and fragmented as it is now -- which i think it is -- then i can't blame the government for the war while i simultaneously absolve it of what's happening currently. it would be hypocritical.
i don't understand why israel didn't deal with hezbullah until 2 days ago. it was no secret that hezbullah was gaining in strength, nor that it has consistently been amassing weapons at the border. if israel holds the lebanese government responsible for hezbullah's actions, then israel should have endeavored to assist the government in becoming stronger, therefore enabling it to combat hezbullah effectively. perhaps entering into direct negotiations with israel wouldn't have been politically sound, but covert channels of communication have always existed and they should have been utilized.
but now that they didn't do that and hezbullah has kidnapped 2 soldiers, i'm not sure what israel should do. they obviously can't just ignore it. they're destroying lebanon's infrastructure, but that's because they're trying to eliminate hezbullah's escape routes, prevent their movement, and cut off their communication. though all of this has undoubtedly made life more difficult for hezbullah, many civilians are now unable to get food, fuel, or leave the country, and most of the dead are noncombatants. moreover, the attacks are paralyzing the economy and turning back the clock of post-war reconstruction at an alarming pace.
what should israel be doing? what should lebanon be doing? god damn the arab-israeli conflict.
posted by Ariana @ 11:50 PM
4 Comments:
Maybe Israel is using Hezbollah as an excuse to destroy Lebanon all over again. Israel does not want to see a succesful and vibrant lebanon. When I was there in 2004 they broke the sound barrier with their jet planes just to scare people while Lebanon was enjoying their best year economically since the end of the war. The only reason Israel is bombing everthing left and right is because they want to see the Lebanese turn on each other. Thankfully, the LEbanese aren't stupid enough to fall for that trick. So many Israeli officials show up on TV with crocidile tears... saying they support Lebanon... what fucking bullshit, they care for LEbanon as much as Ike cared for Tina Turner. Its no wonder why they wanted Hezbollah disarmed...probably so they could face zero opposition to their military incursions in Lebanon. Nasrallah is one of the few with the balls to defend Lebanon. Egypt and Jordan would do well to learn a couple of valuable lessons from him.
First, I agree that Nasrallah and the Lebanese government is weak, and is controlled by Hezbollah. Israel recognizes this too, and that is why they give warnings before they hit places, telling people to evacuate. But, the fact is that Hezbollah uses all of the government’s resources: the Beirut-Damascus high way, the power plants, the airports. Hezbollah attacked and is attacking Israel. Giving Hezbollah a slap on the wrist will allow them to believe that they can continue their actions until they accomplish their goal: eliminating Israel. (I’d like to point out the Hezbollah doesn’t warn Israelis where and when they will be hitting, and they have specifically targeted civilian places).
Second, I don’t think that Israel is acting or should act with the hopes that the Lebanese people will turn against Hezbollah. I am sure that they hope that the Lebanese will open their eyes to the destruction Hezbollah is causing, and the fact that they are using their country to pursue their own agenda. Israel cannot change the conclusions the Lebanese will draw, and I think that, realistically, they will tend to side with the people in their own country than with Israel, regardless of what Israel does or does not do, because they are seen as the enemy and as the oppressor. I also think that Israel knows the soldiers will not be returned to them. But as with criminals, deterrence, denunciation and punishment are required. Otherwise, Israel’s enemies will believe that there are no severe consequences for kidnapping soldiers.
Third, I already mentioned that Israel understands that Lebanon is weak. It attempted to disarm Hezbollah in previous years; it was in Lebanon for many years until Ehud Barak pulled the last troops out. And even after this occurred, Hezbollah has still been sending missiles into Israel. This is not new, it is just more severe. If Israel attacked Hezbollah in an attempt to disarm them without clear and probable cause, they would be harshly criticized and condemned by the international community. Also, I believe that since Lebanon has not made peace with Israel, it should not be Israel’s responsibility to work on their government, but it should be the responsibility of those states Lebanon considers their “friends”, ie: Syria and Iran.
I don’t want to get into Iran, and the fact that the Lebanese people should be angry at their government for using the Lebanese infrastructure and state for promoting their own goals, and making them the scapegoat, since that was not the focus of this post.
Lastly, I don’t know who Bassil is, but I suggest he rethink the situation that Hezbollah has put Lebanon in: if they really cared about your country, they wouldn’t have taken such deliberate and provocative action to put your people into harm’s way.
liat said, "...but it should be the responsibility of those states Lebanon considers their “friends”, ie: Syria and Iran."
i've never seen any official statements about what lebanon thinks of iran, but i certainly don't think that most of the lebanese government considers syria a friend. to the contrary, the majority of the lebanese government is anti-syrian.
the majority of the seats (72/128) in the current parliament are held by the future bloc alliance. this bloc consists of the future movement (saad hariri), the progressive socialist party (walid jumblatt), the lebanese forces (samir geagea), and the qornet shehwan (kataeb -- amin gemayel, national liberal party). hariri has continued the policies of his late father who was most likely assassinated for his unequivocally oppositional stance towards syria. jumblatt began campaigning for the end of syrian influence in lebanon following the death of hafez al-asad in 2000. he regularly comes out with strongly worded statements against hezbullah and alleged last year that the current syrian president, bashar al-asad, threatened to kill him. following the end of the civil war, geagea refused to accept ministry positions because of his opposition to syrian influence. gemayel went into exile from 1988-2000 and, since returning, has organized opposition to current lebanese president, emile lahoud, commonly viewed as a syrian puppet.
on a popular level, i had many lebanese people tell me when i was there that they thought that syria has done more damage to lebanon than israel had. i heard over and over how syria has choked the country and stymied its development. for its part, syria does not officially recognize lebanon, as demonstrated by the absence of a syrian embassy in lebanon. last april, syrian soldiers tried to reclaim some lebanese territory in the northeastern part of the beqaa valley. most lebanese people were infuriated by this and viewed it as proof of syria's continued desires to control lebanon.
in short, hezbullah and its allies and supporters consider syria to be a friend, but that does not mean that lebanon does. here again, hezbullah's views are not reflective of those of the lebanese people or their government.
one of the most interesting things about what's going on now was reported by the bbc yesterday: "Ironically, Israel is punishing and pressuring a largely anti-Syrian government for an action which it blames partly on Syria and Iran, the sponsors and supporters of Hezbollah" (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/5178572.stm); and brian whitaker of the guardian noted that, "The current air and sea blockade has once again made Lebanon heavily dependent on its land neighbour, Syria. After all the fuss last year about ending Syrian influence, Israel is now pushing the two countries together again - the exact opposite of what US and Israeli policy had been seeking to achieve" (http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/brian_whitaker /2006/07/blundering_into_lebanon.html).
I think its important to note that all because a great number of Lebanese are opposed to Syrian involvement in politics does not mean they consider Syria to be an enemy of the Lebanese state. I don't think anyone sees Syria or the Syrian occupation in the same light as the current Israeli one now. The recent political happenings might have strained relations slightly between the two countries but the reality is that they both need each other to survive espescially from an economic standpoint.
On the topic of Israel... they are completley out of control. The kidnapping of two soldiers does not justify the killing of civillians and the destruction of civillian infrastructure. They hit a target kill a family of 12 and start to claim that there was a weapons cache under the house. The warnings are complete bullshit as well. Just yesterday, many tried to enter a UN camp for protection and were turned down thus rendering any warning effectivley useless.
There is a diplomatic soloution to this it is very simple... negotiations, which have happened before need to take place. There are three LEbanese POWs that remain in Israeli jails. All Hezbollah wants is to trade the two soldiers for them and the situation would return to normal.
Instead of negotiations though, Israel has the arrogance to demand that the Lebanese Army not fire on them. I don't know of a single army of the world who would just stand around while the nation was being attacked. One last note, after seeing what Israel is willing to do to terrorize the Lebanese population do you really think Hezbollah should disarm? They have been the only force in Lebanon fighting the Israeli army, who despite their quality having only succeeded in killing and injuring civillians.
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