Various commentators have said that a key factor in the prosecution of wars today, is the management of perceptions. On this score alone, Ehud Olmert, the Israeli Prime Minister, has successfully generated more negative sentiment and antipathy directed towards Israel than the most rabid anti-Semite could have hoped for. This is in itself a great tragedy and it’s yet another casualty of the war.
I have to wonder if Olmert would have orchestrated precisely the response he has, if he didn’t feel a need to fill the shoes of the incapacitated Ariel Sharon? Was Hezbollah the ‘political godsend’ that allows a new leader to define the style of leadership an unwitting electorate can expect? Did Olmert feel that Israelis would respect only a militant leader? Not having come up through the military ranks must be an image burden for Olmert. Instead of a swashbuckling general, Israelis have to contend with (from media interviews) a man who is ‘a legend in his own lunch time’ very status-conscious and power-hungry to boot. Some interviewers have described him as pretentious and vain. Has this, along with his Prime Minister-almost-by-default status, defined all or part of his response? One wonders.
If I ‘walk in the moccasins’ of an Israeli, I’d probably also want to bomb the hell out of anyone with the avowed intention of obliterating me and my loved ones from the face of the earth. Civilian ‘collateral damage’ would not be a sufficient disincentive if it became an issue of survival of the best-armed and equipped.
But if I mentally step over the border into Lebanon, I have to reflect on this: In the history of guerrilla warfare (‘invented’ by the Boers against the British I am told) and terrorist activity, there is a cardinal principle underpinning its dreadful effectiveness. Guerrillas and terrorists don’t compliantly squat en masse in buildings waiting for American-sponsored ‘smart’ or bunker-busting-bombs to come crashing down on their heads. They’re constantly on the move and do most damage via stealth ‘hit and run’ attacks, following which they melt into the civilian population. That’s not new.
In all of the extensive TV coverage of the Lebanese carnage, I have yet to see footage of a civilian home in which weapons caches were discovered or shots of a ‘Stalin Organ’ mobile rocket launcher parked on someone’s patio. I’m not being facetious. The premise that the Israeli Defence Force (IDF) can use ‘surgical strikes’ to eliminate a terrorist movement from inside of civilian neighbourhoods is the most spurious argument I’ve run across in years. There’s simply no logic or precedent to it.
The Israelis have a right to live without having to cower in bomb shelters and bunkers. Jewish kids have a right to walk, cycle, or take mom’s taxi or a bus to school without the threat of Katyusha missiles or a suicide bomber blowing them to bits. But the same rights exist for the overwhelming majority of the Lebanese people.
The idea of ‘collective punishment’ leading to the betrayal or hand-over of the mischief-maker in the midst doesn’t work. The lunatic non-commissioned officers that most South African white males had to contend with during national service verified this thesis beyond contention. The collective ‘afkakparade’ (Afrikaans for literally, ‘shit-off parade’) was the punishment weapon of choice when there was some minor infraction of the myriad imbecile rules that held sway. The notion was that if everyone suffered, somehow sentiment would turn on the individual/s responsible and the system would isolate and deliver the baddies into the hands of the sadists conducting the pack or other drill punishment. Although backstage there may have been some form of peer retribution, the time-tested solidarity of ‘the enemy of my enemy is my friend’ inevitably prevailed. In our case the offender hadn’t created ‘positive’ obligation among his peers. But Hizballah has. It is a benefactor and has rebuilt homes, provided schooling, food and support and is also playing the mafia-like ‘Don’ role in terms of paternalistic care-giving to a sector of the Lebanese community. So the problem becomes way more complex.
The international community has dismally failed the Middle East. The situation is not something either Israel or Lebanon can resolve. As an example, a ‘Berlin Wall’ of desperation splits the Israeli/Palestinian West Bank. It’s a sad metaphor for the polarisation of views on this very topic.
As for America - it provides arms, ammunition and intelligence to Israel on one hand and ‘humanitarian aid’ to the Lebanese who are being attacked with those very same munitions, on the other. If ever there was such a thing as duplicitous morality, this would be it.
The Europeans have the correct view. Regardless of right or wrong, the carnage must be stopped and an international solution must prevail. It makes me think of something Kofi Annan said years ago about genocide: ‘We have the means to stop it but not the will’. That statement was prescient. The Middle East conflict is a terrible indictment of so-called human-kind.
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