Posted by
J.P. Farris on Wednesday, July 26, 2006 10:54:24 PM
Imagine a kid who has been picked on and mistreated and all he wants is a place to call home and live in peace. He moves into a new neighborhood where he is surrounded by bullies. One day he is attacked by a bully from one side and while he is fighting that bully another bully from the other side attacks. It goes without saying that emotions are high and he is on edge, and when he turns to fight the other bully he fights more ferociously because he is being attacked from two sides. Then the big brother of the two bullies decides to get involved. The neighborhood wants them to stop fighting and shake hands because their fighting has become so intense, but the new kid knows that if he stops fighting the bullies will remain to return and clobber him later.
The new kid is Israel which is still relatively young as a nation. The neighborhood is the Middle East. The neighborhood bullies are Hamas, Hezbollah, Syria and Iran. Hamas stirred things up by kidnapping Cpl. Gilad Shilat. As Israel fought to get him back Hezbollah snuck up behind them and attacked. Tensions were already high as Israel fought back. Iran, Syria and Hezbollah were all taken aback by the ferocity of Israel’s response.
{http://www.timeswatch.org/articles/2006/20060726115829.aspx}
Because of that ferocity the big brother of the two bullies (Iran) wants to join the fray, ganging up on the kid (Israel).
{http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/meast/07/26/iran.volunteers.ap/index.html}
(Iran supports Hezbollah and reports say that Iran was also present for North Korea’s missile testing that put the world on edge during the first week of July. It is widely believed that they backed Hezbollah’s actions against Israel in order to divert attention away from their own activities.)
Meanwhile Hezbollah continues to fire rockets at Israel, and unlike Israel they have no qualms about killing civilians. A total of 119 rockets were fired at Israel on Wednesday. In all, 55 Israelis were wounded from rocket attacks in some 35 locations in the country's North on Wednesday, Magen David Adom reported. One person was seriously wounded, five moderately and 25 lightly. 24 people were taken to hospital for shock.
{http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost/JPArticle/ShowFull&cid=1153292000845}
The Iranian Fars news agency in Lebanon quoted a senior Hizbullah official Wednesday as saying that the organization has set a new target for itself - the city of Netanya.
{http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost/JPArticle/ShowFull&cid=1153291996655}
IDF ground forces pushed deeper into Lebanon on Tuesday after troops succeeded in sealing off the Hizbullah stronghold of Bint Jbail following 48 hours of intense battles with the guerilla group.
{http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost/JPArticle/ShowFull&cid=1153291993055}
The battle for the Hizbullah stronghold of Bint Jbeil sparked again this morning into a major conflagration. Israel suffered 25-30 casualties, and dozens of Hizbullah bodies are strewn in the area.
Desperate to escape the war zone, refugees fled for their lives.
{http://www.boston.com/news/world/middleeast/articles/2006/07/26/desperate_refugees_try_to_flee_lebanons_war_zone/}
Tragedy struck when UN peacekeepers got caught in the crossfire. Some at the UN thought it deliberate, but when you think about it...what would be the reason? I believe it is likely that Hezbollah used that area to fire rockets at Israel and Israel retaliated, accidentally killing the UN peacekeepers. Why would they attack someone that was sent in to help put a stop to the hostilities? It makes no sense.
{http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost/JPArticle/ShowFull&cid=1153291996858}
However, CNSNews reports that Kofi Annan Could Have Ordered Peacekeepers to Leave because of the danger surrounding them, but he didn’t.
The four United Nations peacekeepers killed in an Israeli attack on their outpost were required to stay at that post "until they were ordered by the [U.N.] secretary general to withdraw," said a member of the United Nations Truce Supervision Organization on Wednesday.
But the peacekeepers apparently never received such an order, despite the fierce cross-border fighting that erupted in southern Lebanon two weeks ago.
The four peacekeepers -- from China, Austria, Canada and Finland -- had taken security precautions and were in a shelter under their bunker when they were killed, said Wicki Dieter, the chief plans officer for the United Nations Truce Supervision Organization (UNTSO).
(UNTSO is an unarmed U.N. body whose "observer" mandate dates from 1948. By contrast, UNIFIL -- the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon -- was created in 1978 to "restore the international peace and security" in southern Lebanon.)
{http://www.cnsnews.com/ViewForeignBureaus.asp?Page=/ForeignBureaus/archive/200607/INT20060726c.html}
The UN Secretary General remarked to the International Conference on Lebanon:
The people of Lebanon are reliving scenes from a chapter in their country's history they thought had been closed. This time, we need solutions that will stand the test of time. Israelis, for their part, thought they had seen the last of rockets terrorizing them from beyond their northern border, but the conflict has been rejoined more fiercely than thought possible. The wider region, too, can hardly stand another conflict alongside the sectarian strife, extremism and economic stagnation that are already widespread.
{http://www.un.org/apps/sg/sgstats.asp?nid=2150#}
Almost two weeks into its military assault on Hezbollah, Israel said Tuesday that it would occupy a strip inside southern Lebanon with ground troops until an international force could take its place.
{http://www.nytimes.com/2006/07/26/world/middleeast/26mideast.html?_r=1&th&emc=th&oref=slogin}
However French President Jacques Chirac opposed the idea that NATO lead an international force in Lebanon, saying the alliance is seen in the region as "the armed wing of the West."
{http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost/JPArticle/ShowFull&cid=1153292002139}
With an International peacekeeping force coming init is sorely hoped that they avoid the mistakes of the past. It's been a tactic used by Hizballah in the past -- to strike and then seek a quick ceasefire through UNIFIL. Most recently it tried this last December, when an attempt to capture Israeli soldiers failed and led to Israel firing artillery at terrorist positions across the border.
{http://www.cnsnews.com/ViewForeignBureaus.asp?Page=/ForeignBureaus/archive/200607/INT20060726b.html}
Back in 2000 Hezbollah kidnapped three Israeli soldiers in full view of UN peacekeepers.
The Israeli army had been warning for months that Hizballah intended to kidnap Israeli soldiers to be used as bargaining chips to free Lebanese prisoners held in Israeli jails. The most notable member of the Hizballah leadership, Sheikh Obeid, was abducted by Israeli commandos in 1989 with the intention of swapping him for Israeli MIAs.
"Soldiers belonging to the Indian UNIFIL battalion man a small hilltop observation post overlooking the gate and had a clear view of the drama," the Daily Star reported.
"'The Israeli vehicle comes twice a day and at around the same times,' Major Rahendra Bansiwal was quoted as saying. 'Hizbullah must have seen their routine and timed the operation accordingly.'"
According to the report citing the UN eyewitnesses, the three Israeli soldiers drove down the hill leading to the gate in the Shaba farms area to check the fence for damage or infiltration attempts. As the jeep reached the gate, two soldiers climbed out while the driver remained in the vehicle.
A huge roadside bomb was detonated about 55 yards from the Israelis on the Lebanese side of the fence to "disorient" the Israelis. At the same time, a Hizballah guerrilla fired eight Sagger anti-tank missiles across the border by remote control that exploded in front of the vehicle, setting fire to the jeep and the grass.
At the same time, Hizballah fired mortars and Katyusha rockets at nearby Israeli outposts to distract them long enough to break open the gate, drive across and snatch the soldiers, who had been pelted by smoke grenades.
{http://www.cnsnews.com/ForeignBureaus/Archive/200010/For20001011e.html}
Hezbollah, once described as “the A-team of terrorists” by former Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage, is a terrorist group with a record of killing hundreds of Americans and Israelis (from Beirut to Saudi Arabia to Argentina to inside Israel). Hezbollah is of global reach and extent. It began with the fundamental goals of creating an Islamist state in Lebanon and the total annihilation of Israel. It is armed and supported by Syria and Iran, and it has branches in some 20 countries. It occupies 20 percent of the Lebanese parliament but that percentage does not give it sufficient due. Here is Amir Taheri in the London Times:
Hezbollah is a state within the Lebanese state. It controls some 25% of the national territory. Almost 400,000 of Lebanon’s estimated 4 million inhabitants live under its control. It collects its own taxes with a 20% levy, known as “khoms”, on all incomes. It runs its own schools, where a syllabus produced in Iran is taught at all levels. It also runs clinics, hospitals, social welfare networks and centres for orphans and widows.
The party controls the elected municipal councils and appoints local officials, who in theory should be selected by the central government in Beirut. To complete its status as a virtual state, the party maintains a number of unofficial “embassies”: the one in Tehran is bigger and has a larger number of staff than that of Lebanon itself.
Hezbollah also has its own media including a satellite television channel, Al-Manar (the lighthouse), which is watched all over the Arab world, four radio stations, newspapers and magazines plus a book publishing venture. The party has its own system of justice based on sharia and operates its own police force, courts and prisons. Hezbollah runs youth clubs, several football teams and a number of matrimonial agencies.
In sum, it may very well have the run of Lebanon more than non-Hezbollah factions and institutions. Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of Hezbollah, brags about this today.
As for Israel’s disproportion, it is worth remembering that Israel is but one state — with a majority of Jews but a substantial Arab population. The Arab states number 22. The land-mass comparison is some 10,000 square miles compared to over five million square miles. That does not include Iran. The Palestinian Authority, situated now in the southwest of Israel, is a Hamas entity — it is more lethal and Islamist than Arafat’s PLO.
{http://www.townhall.com/columnists/column.aspx?UrlTitle=israel,_the_model&ns=BillBennett&dt=07/26/2006&page=1}
Israel is a kid up against some of the biggest bullies in the Middle East.