Now recriminations begin in Israel (TIMES UK)

[laststeamtrain]

Now recriminations begin in Israel
Dean Godson
The failure of the Lebanon campaign may destroy the Kadima party and its leader

EHUD OLMERT’S greatest sin in the eyes of the Israeli public is not that the war in Lebanon was “disproportionate”, but that he did not win it. Now that hostilities seem to be winding down, the debate over the conduct of one of the most unsuccessful military campaigns in the history of the Jewish state has begun with a vengeance. And it could bring about the demise of the Prime Minister and the new, centrist, Kadima party that he led to victory in the election in March.

There is a word in Hebrew for such a reversal: mechdal. It means something along the lines of “culpable failure resulting from inadequate preparation and inaction”. It was last in common currency after the Yom Kippur War in 1973, when the Israeli political and military leadership failed to anticipate the attack by two Arab armies.

The initial reverses of 1973 were so traumatic that they triggered a chain of protests. These eventually dethroned the Labour Party, which had dominated politics for three decades, and paved the way for the ascendancy of Likud.

But whatever the difficulties of the opening days of the 1973 war, by its end the Israelis could boast significant battlefield successes, such as crossing the Suez Canal. Even in Lebanon in 1982, whatever the costs to Israel’s reputation abroad, it could accurately assert that the Palestine Liberation Organisation had been ejected from its northern neighbour.

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http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,6-2316298,00.html

[Sherman A1]

1. Yes, I believe that there are many questions to ask

both inside and outside of Israel over this latest episode. I suspect many of them will never be asked, much less answered.

[izzie]

2. If Hezllabar just made itself a corp. in the Cayman Island they

could do anything like Blackwater of Custerbattle and every thing would be OK and no one would have to worry . Every one could kill each other and feel they were in their rights. Isreal has to just get with the US on this war business.