SEPTEMBER 2006

Tuesday, August 22, 2006

It must be frightening to be an Israeli now.  The class bully comes back from summer vacation and finds that all the little kids he used to beat up are now bigger than he is.  Although we’ll never read it in the mainstream press, and in fact are seeing a small tsunami of articles on ‘making Aliyah’, I’m sure there is a big net emigration from Israel, as it suddenly has become apparent that he who lives by the sword, dies by the sword (the ‘demographic problem’ is about to become much worse).  Instead of using the lessons learned in Lebanon to lead to an interest in negotiation, the Israeli right is using the defeat as a prod to push for more violence.  Soon, Netanyahu will be back in power, and the almost hopeless situation will become completely hopeless.

By the way, the test of good faith in reading anything on this issue is whether an attempt is made to claim that the Israeli attack on Lebanese civilians was an act of self-defense.  If you see even a hint of ‘self-defense’, the writer is incapable of understanding that it is not acceptable to slaughter civilians and destroy an entire country in retaliation for the capture of two soldiers, particularly when:

• The soldiers were almost certainly captured in Lebanon;
• There have recently been hundreds of incidents along the border, almost all instigated by Israel, and none of which led to military escalation;
• Hezbollah captured the soldiers in order to exchange them for Lebanese held illegally by Israel;
• the Israeli attack on Lebanon had been planned for at least a year before the Israeli soldiers were captured.

An inability to comprehend that the Israel-has-a-right-to-defend-itself defense has moral limits is the unique Israeli/Zionist form of psychopathy.  It is based - and unfortunately this in now undeniable, and forms the basis for the right-left Israeli consensus that the problem with the attack was that not enough Lebanese were killed - in the unstated assumption that Jews are the only human beings that have moral worth.  This also explains why prominent Jewish ‘human rights’ advocates seem to have no interest in the plight of the Palestinians.  Only human beings have human rights, and the only full human beings are Jewish.

There is no obvious direct military threat to Israel’s existence.  Hezbollah’s victory – and it was a clear victory, with the small number of Hezbollah military funerals leading to the conclusion that the death ratio was probably well over two-to-one in favor of Hezbollah – was completely defensive.  Nevertheless, the entire equation of Israel’s existence has always been based on the idea that no Arab could defeat an IDF operation.  That delusion has been shattered.  The problem was both at the level of the highest military and political planners, and at the level of the IDF, and at the level of the Israeli soldiers.

The planners seemed to think that extensive intentional bombing of civilians would cause the Lebanese to blame Hezbollah for their problems, thus removing the civilian support for Hezbollah, thus leading to an easy Israeli military victory.  Instead, as any fool could tell you would happen, Lebanese civilian opinion went entirely against the people dropping the bombs, and entirely towards the only group in the country with the ability to defend the Lebanese people.  The Israelis based their analysis on the NATO success at bombing Serbian civilians, missing the point that Serbia had a functioning government in charge of the whole country which cared about the status of its civilian population.  NATO blackmailed the central Serbian government into capitulating on the basis that it would keep slaughtering civilians until the government gave up.  Since the central Lebanese government had no control over Hezbollah, the bombing plan was flawed from the outset, and just served to strengthen Hezbollah.  Once again, the dream of military planners, that a war can be won from the air, has been proven to be wrong.

The Israelis are noticing(article below)that the IDF has become sloppy and ineffective, largely based on the fact that it has been exclusively employed as a police unit in charge of brutalizing Palestinian civilians.  Israeli soldiers, used to showing force to groups of cowering Palestinian grandmothers, arrogantly stood around in Lebanese mountain passes, allowing Hezbollah to take them out in groups using anti-tank weapons.  Even worse, the entire fighting ability of the IDF, both tactics and military hardware, has been formed around battling Palestinian small arms fire in urban settings on relatively flat ground.  In the hills of Lebanon, facing well trained soldiers with anti-tank weapons, the Israelis were sitting ducks.  A fighting unit geared around an ability to fire tank shells into groups of Palestinian schoolchildren was no match for Hezbollah.  There is some karma in this:  a history of brutalizing Palestinian civilians has made the IDF ineffective as a fighting force against real soldiers.

The final problem – and mentioning this is the ultimate taboo – is with the soldiers themselves.  Israelis have always fought valiantly on the theory that the Jewish people had their backs against the wall and that the fight to preserve the Jewish people from anti-Semitic annihilation was just.  Sending conscripts – many of them born in the Soviet Union and dragged by their phony-Jew parents to Israel as part of the ongoing Israeli scam to increase its non-Arab population, and with no interest in Israel or Jewish history or culture –  who correctly understand that there is no real ‘existential threat’ to Israel, to risk their lives so the settlers can have swimming pools full of stolen water, isn’t quite the same thing.  In fact, it was the Hezbollah soldiers who benefited from the fact that they knew their fight to defend their families and their country was just.  We are now seeing the lies that form the basis of racist Israeli statehood finally coming home to roost.

But they cannot resist a brag:

"Summary of IDF airstrikes during Operation Change of Direction:

• More than 7,000 targets struck in Lebanon
• 15,500 sorties flown over Lebanon, including:
  • More than 10,000 combat missions
  • 2,000 helicopter combat missions (most of them looking for Hasan Dib Nasrallah)
    
  • 1,000 helicopter search-and-rescue missions
  • 1,200 transport missions
  • Over 1,300 reconnaissance missions
  • Summary of IDF naval operations during Operation Change of Direction:
  • Navy vessels sailed over 8,000 hours along the Lebanese coast
  • The Navy conducted 2,500 bombardments of targets along the Lebanese coast including missile launch sites, missile launchers, weapons storage sites, coastal roads, other Hezbollah infrastructure, Hezbollah radar installations, and fuel stations and depots
  • Blockade of Lebanese coast for 33 days, while permitting over 200 vessels through for purposes of evacuating civilians or providing humanitarian aid"
    
    

ANALYSIS: Policing in Gaza has blunted IDF fighting abilities
Haaretz Correspondent, Z.Schiff

One of the main conclusions of the war against Hezbollah will be the
fact that the fighting abilities of the ground forces deployed by the Israel Defense Forces in Lebanon have been blunted by years of police action in the territories.

Most units, in their training and operations, followed fighting doctrines of police forces and not of standing armies. Hezbollah trains, fights and is equiped as an army, utilizing some of the most advanced anti-tank missiles and other weapons.The character of the IDF - known for its blitzkrieg methods, encircling
movements deep inside enemy territory, and the ability to bring about a quick and decisive conclusion to the fighting - has been spoiled by years of involvement in operations that tied it down, emotionally and politically.

This included missions to stop terrorist cells, dealing with suicide bombings, the use of light weapons for the most part, and closures and sieges imposed on large population centers. Many of the IDF's reservists operate alongside the Shin Bet security service personnel to carry out arrests of wanted Palestinians. Battalions of reservists stood guard over Palestinians in detention centers.

In many ways, the IDF became the standing army of the Shin Bet. This is not the army that Israel knew in the Yom Kippur War of 1973 or the 1982 Lebanon War, which were both followed by a public commission of inquiry. Many of the advantages and operational qualities of the IDF have been lost over the years because the army has been fighting the wrong war  from a military point of view.

It would have been better, for example, had the war against the Palestinians been handled by the Border Police, allowing the regular army and its reservists to train for a different type of warfare.

It turns out that many of the commanders in Lebanon learned their trade in the fighting in the territories, and they thought in terms of fighting the Palestinians. The "Palestinian model" guided the way IDF units fought the bloody battles at Maroun al-Ras and Bint Jbail. The units entered the battle and withdrew, similar to the way they operate in the Gaza Strip.

The IDF was also surprised in Lebanon by the amount of anti-tank missiles
fired by Hezbollah. The immediate reaction in the territories is to take cover in the closest home. In Lebanon, many soldiers were killed when anti-tank missiles penetrated walls behind which IDF troops had taken cover. Two weeks into the fighting, a specific order went out on how and where to take cover.

In Lebanon, soldiers fought in bunkers just like the Americans in Vietnam. A Hezbollah prisoner, who was part of an anti-tank missile team, said that during their training, they were allowed to fire as many as 15 anti-tank missiles. These are very costly, and the IDF doesn't even dream of such training, even though the experience is invaluable.

Another example is the deployment of the Golani Brigade from the Gaza Strip to Lebanon. It turns out that this excellent fighting force lacked officer expertise in coordinating with artillery batteries, something that they don't have to do very often in their policing duties.



Editor:As they now exercise their fighting deficiencies in Gaza we may read more on.....

ISRAELI HÚBRIS
Gilad Atzmon© Aug 22.

“The ceasefire in Lebanon was holding by a thread last night after Israel sanctioned a commando raid in the east of the country. Kofi Annan, the United Nations Secretary General, said Israel had violated the truce, and he was 'deeply concerned' about it.” The Guardian

For those who are familiar with Israeli aggression, the IDF violation was no surprise at all. For a week or so, every Israeli cabinet member and military official promised publicly that it is just a question of time before there is a ‘second round’. Indeed, they must come up with something. Since the end of the hostilities, all Israeli political analysts and polls suggest that Israel’s political and military leadership failed completely. If elections were to be held soon, both Labour and Kadima would simply disappear. It is no secret that with each passing day, Olmert’s and Peretz’s popularity continually slumps to new lows. Jerusalem Post.

One may wonder whether the Israelis are changing their spots, do they stop approving Olmert’s policies just because peace is what they really prefer? The influential political commentator Ari Shavit provided an answer two weeks ago. Mr Olmert, so he says, had ‘failed shamefully’ and should resign. Shavit continues, "You cannot lead an entire nation to war promising victory, produce humiliating defeat and remain in power." As I mentioned more than once before, the Israeli politician has to cope with a demanding, bloodthirsty crowd.

This realisation throws some light over the reasons behind the failed Israeli operation in Lebanon just three days ago. Israelis are simply desperate to win. But it may also explain why Israeli government decided to expand its military operation pretty much at the same time it accepted the UN ceasefire resolution. Olmert knew that he must serve his voters with what they interpret as a clear-cut victory. This would mean either some severe form of revenge with lots of Arab casualties or a significant land invasion. Olmert, his ‘national unity’ government and the army leadership have to do something that would cover up four weeks of disastrous military campaign that failed to serve the Israeli public with even a single second of glory.

Indeed, the IDF military offensive doctrine is grounded on one basic axiom that was defined by David Ben Gurion in the early fifties: whatever it takes, Israel must always win! This axiom is indeed very powerful, yet, in reality, the Israeli army can’t provide the goods anymore. In the last three decades the Israeli army is constantly being beaten time after time by enemies that are getting smaller and smaller.

Yet, one may mention that the IDF isn’t very original in being defeated. The IDF fails exactly where the American army has been failing since Vietnam. Shockingly, the IDF has managed to copy every possible American mistake. It religiously adopted the new American military philosophy of a ‘compact highly sophisticated fighting force’. Undeniably, this very doctrine is very effective in producing some gigantic collateral damage i.e., war crimes. Yet, in the long run, it fails miserably to win wars. The new American military doctrine may win a battle or two but no more than that. In the most recent years it has been totally beaten in Afghanistan, Iraq, Gaza and obviously in Lebanon.

Though the early stages of the Israeli campaign in Lebanon looked very much like the first few days of the second Gulf War (major air assault on civilian infrastructure and populated areas), there is at least one major noticeable difference. While America can stand and even ignore international criticism referring to its own war crimes, it isn’t willing to suffer much international criticism for Israeli atrocities. While in the early stages of the war America was rushing to provide Israel with air convoys loaded with its most lethal conventional arsenal, we have learned towards the last week of the war that the American administration changed its mind, it suddenly refused to provide the IDF with a shipment of cluster bombs because it “would endanger the civilian population”. Seemingly, there is a limit to what the Americans are willing to do for their ‘closest friend’ in the Middle East.

This is exactly where the Israeli limbo is. In order to maintain its status as a winning regional super power, Israel needs the blind support of America (politically, financially and logistically). Yet American blind support can be granted to Israel only if the Jewish State is indeed a regional super- power to start with. Olmert and his government are fully aware of this very complexity. They know that without being a regional super power in the first place, they have nothing to offer their almighty American brothers. Israel is crucial for the strategy of the Americans as long as it can wipe out all its enemies in six days at the most. The way things appear now, the Israeli Army is basically defeated by the two smallest nations in the Arab world, the Palestinian and the Lebanese ones.

As much as it clear to the Israelis, it is clear to the Americans that unlike the bold Hezbollah, the IDF soldier has lost his will to fight. The IDF is a spoiled, confused and tired army that is specialising solely in terrorising civilian populations while being engaged in constant tactical withdraw. This Israeli Army is not trained to win wars anymore. Instead, its tank battalions are mainly engaged in daily shelling of schools and hospitals. Its Air Force uses the best American fighter planes to flatten neighbourhoods and shoot deadly rockets at cars in the streets of Gaza. Its command units are specialising in abducting democratically elected middle-aged Palestinian politicians. The IDF is basically a heavy army specialising in merciless regional bullying. Yet, it cannot win a war, and as such it has nothing to offer the American empire.

But the Israeli military defeat has some further implications. Israel without a victorious army, has nothing to offer to world Jewry either. It can never present itself as the ultimate cosmic Judeo bunker. It is pretty shocking to survey the relative silence of the infamous Zionist media shield. While just six weeks ago the loud supporters of Anglo-American interventionism were still pushing for democracy in the Arab world and beyond, they were enthusiastic about killing in the name of human rights and about Israel being the only democracy in the Middle East. Somehow, since the war began, since Israel revealed once again its murderous tendencies and Hezbollah proved to be the new Robin Hood, these voices are caving in. Many among the global Zionists do already realise now that the Anglo-American assault on the Arab world has suffered a major blow. Some of them probably grasp that it is just a question of time before more and more Europeans and Americans join the sacred battle against the Americanised Global Zionism, i.e., neo-conservatism.

The recent victory of the Hezbollah therefore must be realised as a major event with some global implications. While the Hezbollah regards itself as a paramilitary organisation, concerned mainly with some local issues having to do with Israeli expansionism, it has managed to cause a serious blow to neo-conservatism as a political praxis as well as a philosophy. It has beaten the Zionised Anglo-American world-view. Standing up to Zionism and Americanism, it is the Lebanese, the Palestinians, the Iraqis, the Afghanis and the Iranians who happen to be at the vanguard of the war for humanity and humanism. For those who are yet to be convinced that this indeed is the case, I will mention that the fact that it is Iran, who rushed to pay 3 billion dollars to rebuild Lebanon after the destruction made by ‘American interventionism’, leaving no room for doubt. While America spreads destruction and death all over the world, it is Iran and the Hezbollah that offers a new beginning.

Olmert knows very well that if Israel doesn’t win this war, it is global Zionism that is defeated, he knows as well that without the backing of global Zionism, Israel is basically a dead entity. Olmert knows that without America, it won’t take long before Israel turns into an historic event. Israel will have to win its mighty regional power status whatever it takes. Israeli is indeed in the very eye of the neo-conservative storm. And the Hezbollah is threatening something far greater than just the Jewish State. As the Israelis keep telling us, the fight in Lebanon will resume soon and every European leader knows it. Even now, they all know who is going to be the aggressor when violence spreads again in the region. They are all clever enough to hesitate about whether they want to send their soldiers to the region. They know that if Israel "must" win, it is better to stay out of its way.
www.gilad.co.uk



GOOD MORNING ELIJAHU!

Uri Avnery
August 23 2006

A STORY has it that Oscar Wilde once attended the premiere of a colleague's play and every few minutes raised his hat. When asked about this odd behavior, he replied: "I am a courteous person. I raise my hat when I meet an old acquaintance."

If I wore a hat, I would have to raise it every few minutes these days when I view TV talk shows, listen to the radio or read the papers. I keep meeting things I wrote years ago, and especially things I have written since the beginning of this war.

For example: for decades I have warned again and again that the occupation is corrupting our army. Now the papers are full of learned articles by respected commentators, who have discovered - surprise! surprise! - that the occupation has corrupted our army.

In such cases we say in Hebrew: "Good morning, Elijahu!" You have woken up at long last.

If there is a touch of irony in my remark, I do apologize. After all, I wrote in the hope that my words would convince the readers - and especially people of the Israeli establishment - and that they would pass them on. When this is happening now, I am quite happy about the plagiarism.

But it is important to spell out how the occupation has "corrupted our army". Otherwise it is just an empty slogan, and we shall learn nothing from it.

A PERSONAL flashback: in the middle of the 1948 war I had an unpleasant experience. After a day of heavy fighting, I was sleeping soundly in a field near the Arab village Suafir (now Sapir). All around me were sleeping the other soldiers of my company, Samson's Foxes. Suddenly I was woken up by a tremendous explosion. An Egyptian plane had dropped a bomb on us. Killed: none. Wounded: 1.

How's that? Very simple: we were all lying in our personal foxholes, which we had dug, in spite of our fatigue, before going to sleep. It was self-evident to us that when we arrived anywhere, the first thing to do was dig in. Sometimes we changed locations three times a day, and every time we dug foxholes. We knew that our lives depended on it.

Not anymore. In one of the most deadly incidents in the Second Lebanon War, 12 members of a company were killed by a rocket near Kfar Giladi, while sitting around in an open field. The soldiers later complained that they had not been led to a shelter. Have today's soldiers never heard of a foxhole?  Have they been issued with personal shovels at all?

Inside Lebanon, why did the soldiers congregate in the rooms of houses, where they were hit by anti-tank missiles, instead of digging foxholes?

It seems that the army has been weaned from this practice. No wonder: an army that is dealing with "terrorists" in the West Bank and Gaza does not need to take any special precautions. After all, no air force drops bombs on them, no artillery shells them. They need no special protection.

THAT IS true of all our armed forces on land, in the air and on the sea. It is certainly a luxury to fight against an enemy who cannot defend himself properly. But it is dangerous to get used to it.

The navy, for example. For years now it has been sailing along the shores of Gaza and Lebanon, shelling at pleasure, arresting fishermen, checking ships. It never dreamed that the enemy could shoot back. Suddenly it happened - and on live television, too. Hizbullah hit it with a land-to-sea missile.

There was no end to the surprise. It was almost considered as Chutzpah. What, an enemy who shoots back? What next? And why did Army Intelligence not warn us that they have such an unheard of thing, a land-to-sea missile?

IN THE air as on the sea. For years now, Air Force pilots shoot and bomb and kill at will. They are able to hit a moving car with great precision (together with the passers-by, of course.) Their technical level is excellent. But what? Nobody is shooting at them while they are doing this.

The Royal Air Force boys during the blitz ("the few to whom so many owe so much") had to confront the determined pilots of the Luftwaffe, and most of them were killed. Later, the British and Americans who bombed Germany ran the gauntlet of murderous flak.

But our pilots have no such problems. When they are in action over the West Bank and Gaza, there are no enemy pilots, no surface-to-air missiles, no flak. The sky belongs to them, and they can concentrate on their real job: to destroy the infrastructure of life and act as flying executioners, "eliminate" the objects of "targeted liquidations", feeling only a "slight bang on the wing" while releasing a one-ton bomb over a residential area.

Does that create a good air force? Does that prepare them for battle with a real enemy? In Lebanon the pilots have not (yet) met anti-aircraft fire. The only helicopter shot down was hit by anti-tank fire while landing troops. But what about the next war everybody is speaking about?

AND THE ground troops? Were they prepared for this war?

For 39 years now they have been compelled to carry our the jobs of a colonial police force: to run after children throwing stones and Molotov cocktails, to drag away women trying to protect their sons from arrest, to capture people sleeping at home. To stand for hours at the checkpoints and decide whether to let a pregnant woman reach the hospital or send back a sick old man. At the worst, they have to invade a casbah, to face untrained "terrorists" who have nothing but Kalashnikovs to fight against the tanks and airplanes of their occupiers, as well as courage and an unbelievable determination.

Suddenly these soldiers were sent to Lebanon to confront tough, well trained and highly motivated guerilla fighters who are ready to die while carrying out their mission. Fighters who have learned to appear from an unexpected direction, to disappear into well-prepared bunkers, to use advanced and effective weapons.

"We were not trained for this war!" the reserve soldiers now complain. They are right. Where could they have been trained? In the alleys of Jabalieh refugee camp? In the well-rehearsed scenes of embraces and tears, while removing pampered settlers with "sensitivity and determination"? Clearly it was easier to blockade Yasser Arafat and his few untrained bodyguards in the Mukata'ah compound in Ramallah than to conquer Bint Jbeil over and over again.

That applies even more to the tanks. It is easy to drive a tank along the main street of Gaza or over a row of houses in a refugee camp, facing only stone-throwing boys, when the opponent has no trained fighters or half-way modern weapons. It's a hell of a difference driving the same tank in a built-up area in Lebanon, when a trained guerilla with an effective anti-tank weapon can lurk behind every corner. That's a different story altogether. The more so as our army's most modern tank is not immune from missiles.

The deepest rot appeared in the logistics system. It just did not function. And why should it? There is no need for complex logistics to  bring water and food to the soldiers at the Kalandia checkpoint.

THE SIMPLE truth is that for decades now our army has not faced a serious military force. The last time was 24 years ago, during the First Lebanon War, when it fought against the Syrian army. 

At the time we said in my magazine, Haolam Hazeh, that the war was a complete military failure, a fact that was suppressed by all the military commentators. In that war, too, our army did not reach its targets on time according to the plan: it reached them either late or not at all. In the Syrian sector the army did not reach its assigned objective at all: the Beirut-Damascus road. In the Palestinian sector, it reached that road much too late, and only after violating the agreed cease-fire.

The last serious war of our army was the Yom Kippur war. After the initial disgraceful setbacks, it did indeed attain an impressive victory. But that was only six years into the occupation. Now, 33 years later, we see the full damage done by the cancer called occupation, which by now has spread to all the organs of the military body.

How to stop the cancer?

The military commentator Ze'ev Schiff has a patent medicine. Schiff generally reflects the views of the army high command. (Perhaps over the last 40 years, there may have been instances when he voiced opinions that were not identical with those of the General Staff, but if so, they have escaped me.) He proposes to shift the burden of occupation from the army to the Border Police.

Sounds reasonable, but is completely unrealistic. How can Israel create a second big force to maintain the occupation, on top of the army, which already costs something approaching 12 billion dollars a year?

But, thank goodness, there is another remedy. An amazingly simple one: to free ourselves from the occupation once and for all. To get out of the occupied territories in agreement and cooperation with the Palestinians. To make peace with the Palestinian people, so they can establish their independent state side by side with Israel.

And, while we are at it, to make peace with Syria and Lebanon, too.

So that the "Defense Army for Israel", as it is officially called in Hebrew, can go back to its original purpose: to defend the recognized  international borders of the State of Israel.

The Ministry of Education Intends To Expand Preparation for Military Service
http://www.newprofile.org/showdata.asp?pid=1133
[By: Gilad Grosman [Translated by Dorothy and Israel Naor], 23/08/2006]  

The complaint heard during the war in Lebanon regarding decreased motivation of youngsters to conscript did not fall on deaf years; the ministry intends to expand the preparation for military service curriculum within the educational framework as a result of a reduction in conscription. The plan expands the program to begin with younger students.

Ma’ariv NRG learned that two weeks ago Shmuel Abouav, General Director of the Ministry of Education, met with the army’s Chief Education Officer, Brigadier General Ilan Harari, and received from him a survey of the number of youngsters enlisting.

The data shows that in some areas up to 20% of the youngsters will not enlist; consequently, the Ministry decided to formulate an orderly program addressing the subject immediately at the beginning of the new school year. The aim of the Ministry is to identify as early as in the 10th grade those youngsters with a low probability to be conscripted, and to assign them accompaniment by educational and military personnel.

“The war in Lebanon sharpened the fact that Israel is fighting an existential war, and as brought up for discussion the importance of enlisting in the army,” said Abouav. “In recent years conscription has become a question of choice instead of an obligation; it is important that we struggle with this phenomenon.”

The director general of the Ministry of Education added: “We will identify the schools where the number of conscripts is lower than the national average, and will find a way to convey this information to the school, so as to emphasize the need to enlist in the army. These are schools where the low percentage of enlistment is recurrent.”


Wishing to Expand the Program

For the past thirty years, the Ministry of Education has been carrying out a program called “readiness to serve and preparedness for the IDF [Israeli military],” the objective being to prepare youngsters for military and national service. The program includes a long list of projects, excursions, and workshops whose purpose is to increase motivation to conscript. Two years ago, an experimental project, called The Next Generation, began. It’s purpose is to motivate youngsters to meaningful military service” [i.e, its purpose is to motivate youngsters to volunteer for elite units. D]

Senior military officers met with youngsters about to be conscripted and discussed their future military service. The officers shared their personal military experiences with the youngsters, and helped them prepare for their military service.

The ministry now wants to expand the program to include also younger pupils. In addition, the ministry will cooperate with the army to identify schools with a low percentage of conscripts, and to bring this to the attention of the schools themselves.

A week ago the chief of the Manpower division of the army, Brigadier General Elazar Stern, created an outcry when he said in an interview on the military radio station that he had had hardly any visits to bereaved families in Tel Aviv. The interviewer asked him if he has heard from bereaved families some sort of complaint about an unequal sharing of the burden. He replied, “Not from the families, but I see what houses I visit. With all the pain and pride that I feel, I also see the houses that I don’t visit.”

Stern refused to reveal the numbers of Tel Aviv residents in combat units, but said that these data are likely to cause anger. Stern additionally said that the army intends to publish the classification of schools that contribute most to combat units and officer training.

DELUSIONAL EXPECTATIONS

John Chuckman
July 28, 2006

At this writing, Israel has killed six hundred civilians in Lebanon, including more than one hundred children, and killed another one hundred and fifty in Gaza. It has created hundreds of thousands of refugees and destroyed enough bridges and power stations and apartments to create misery for years to come.

Nothing is more dishonest than attempting to justify this barbarism with "Islamist fundamentalists declare their goal openly to destroy the state of Israel and kill Jews."

There is no possibility that Israel can be destroyed by Islamic fundamentalists: the notion is simply a fantasy. This is so not just because of Israel's ready willingness to bomb and kill, but because of great-power guarantees. It is so also because no Arab state believes any longer that Israel’s destruction is a sensible or possible goal, despite their leaders’ public rhetoric. And it is true because the enemies Israel claims are so threatening, organizations such as Hezbollah or Hamas, are militarily weak by any rational standard of calculation.

Israel began by moving into a bad neighborhood, and everyone involved understood this from the beginning, yet Israel behaves as though it should be normal to enjoy a pristine Disney-like suburb with white-picket fences. It reacts to activities in the bad neighborhood that disturb its fantasy with ferocious indignation. Israel's destructive behavior is explained largely by this delusional expectation.

If Israel had spent half the resources it has spent on war over the last fifty years instead on helping its neighbors and building up their economies, the region would be a far better place today. And if Israel had been willing to make reasonable concessions to the needs of others in the region, there might well be lasting peace today.

The irony of Israel’s current destructive behavior is that a healthy, prosperous Lebanon is in Israel’s long-term interest, just as it is in Israel’s interest to have all of its neighbors prosperous and flourishing.

But, instead, Israel’s response to any provocation from any gang or individual is always war and maintaining "the iron wall" - an early Zionist phrase that has provided the foundation of Israeli policy for over half a century - against all outsiders with disregard for their interests or needs.

Deception is an important tool in any war, and Israel’s extensive use of it shows us how it regards neighbors and others it should have cultivated as friends. Look at the bombing of a UN observation post in Lebanon, killing four unarmed UN workers. Israel says it was an accident, but the post had been there for years, and it was well marked. Moreover, the UN workers were killed in a bunker, meaning that a certain kind of munition had to be used to kill them. According to a BBC report, the UN peacekeepers had contacted Israeli forces ten times about artillery shelling in the hours before they were hit by a precision-guided missile. How possibly can this have been an accident?

Could the failed international conference in Rome where proposals for an immediate cease-fire and an international force in Southern Lebanon were advocated have provided Israel’s motive? The cease-fire proposal was quickly killed by the United States to give Israel more bombing time. Was the proposal for an international force the target of Israel’s attack? Who would commit observers or troops if this is what would happen to them? We know Israel does not want outside interference in Lebanon. More broadly, Israel has shown intense hostility towards the UN for years, perhaps one of its closest bonds with Bush’s mob.

There is some evidence that the Israeli soldiers kidnapped at the beginning of the current bombardment were actually kidnapped inside Lebanon on a provocative mission. I have no idea whether this true, but it is far from improbable. The kidnapping has certainly provided an excuse for bombing the hell out of southern Lebanon.

Israel’s many past deceptions naturally enough leave one uncomfortable about any of its official statements on any important matter. First was the covert creation of a nuclear arsenal, a fact not acknowledged to this day. Then there was Israel’s secret assistance to apartheid South Africa, including still-unacknowledged assistance in creating and testing a nuclear weapon. There was Israel’s manipulation of events leading to the Six Day War, a war Israel knew it could handily win for great gains (see my March, 2003, article, Was Einstein Right? ). There was Israel’s attempt to sink the U.S.S. Liberty, an American spy ship, during the Six Day War, an event never meaningfully explained but likely intended to prevent evidence of atrocities against captured Egyptian soldiers in the Sinai being recorded. A large group of Israeli spies was arrested after 9/11, but their extensive activities in the United States leading up to that event have never been explained. Only a few weeks ago, before its attacks on Lebanon and Gaza, Israel mounted an effort claiming the munition which wiped out a Palestinian family on a Gaza beach belonged to someone else, when in fact a collected scrap of casing clearly showed its American origin, a type of munition not made available to anyone else in the region.

All gangs and individuals who rudely remind Israel that it really does live in a bad neighborhood are simply flattened, but flattening the perpetrators is never enough. Always Israel takes the lives of innocents and destroys their property, believing that such ruthlessness eventually will intimidate everyone around into a zombie-like peace, but this is simply another delusion.

The logic of Israel’s behavior taken to its limit would have a two- or three-hundred mile perimeter around Israel’s border (whatever that is) bulldozed and paved over. This would certainly provide complete security, but it is utter fantasy, just as impossible as the destruction of Israel.

What is the solution in the Middle East? It is found in so simple an act as Israel’s dealing fairly with its neighbors and negotiating to sort things out. Israel has never yet done this. It presents only an iron wall, bristling with weapons. When breakthroughs do come, as with the Oslo Accords, Israel’s establishment quietly ignores them or works actively against them while still talking about peace.

Israel has all the advantages. It has advanced weapons. It has great-power guarantees. It has billions of dollars in assistance every year. It has unmatched access to American intelligence and government. By comparison, Hamas and Hezbollah are pretty anemic forces.

Organizations like Hezbollah and Hamas owe their very existence to Israel's past behavior. Hezbollah flourished as a guerrilla force opposing Israel's previous invasion of Lebanon and its long-term partial occupation. It served also as an important charity in the midst of chaos. Hamas was created with the deliberate help of Israeli intelligence, intending to create a rival for the PLO and introduce instability into Palestinian politics. When Hamas was elected recently as part of the government of Palestine, it was only after innumerable excuses from Israel for not meeting with Abbas and after imprisoning and threatening Arafat for several years before his death. How are Palestinians to deal with an Israel that always has an excuse for not negotiating, for not even speaking, to its government? Israel has now kidnapped the cabinet of an elected government, but this is quietly supported by Bush’s democracy-loving mob.

Israel wants us to accept the simplistic assertion that organizations like Hezbollah and Hamas are proof of Islamist determination to destroy Israel. So long as this is the accepted view, greatly over-simplifying a truly complex situation, there can be no understanding and no sensible approach to peace. Refusing even to talk with the democratically-elected Hamas government and cutting it off from all connections and revenues was an act of war in response to party slogans. You can't build peace on fantasy.

I said Israel could not be destroyed by anyone, but there is an important exception to that statement: Israel could well be destroyed by itself.