The savaging of Lebanon (an Asian POV)

[Tom Yossarian Joad]

Sun, 2006-07-30 03:53

By Dayan Jayatilleka

Certainly, every state has a right to defend itself. Israel has a right to retaliate for the seizure of its soldiers by Hamas and Hezbollah, and to defend itself against rocket attacks. This however does not translate itself into the right to wittingly kill civilians, shatter civilian infrastructure, and kidnap elected members of parliament, which is what Israel has done in Lebanon and Gaza. The right way for Israel to have responded would have been to target the military leaders and units of Hezbollah and Hamas, be it in air-sea strikes, deep penetration commando raids or individual assassinations, of which Israel was master in past decades. Instead, Israel has resorted to massive criminality.

While Tony Blair has discredited himself by being caught on an open microphone at the G8 summit in St. Petersburg seemingly canvassing permission from George Bush for a visit to the Middle East and not being accorded it, a British junior minister has condemned Israel’s conduct. On a visit to Lebanon, Foreign Office Minister Kim Howells said: “The destruction of the infrastructure and the deaths of so many children and so many people - these have not been surgical strikes. If you are chasing Hezbollah, well, go for Hezbollah. You don’t target the entire Lebanese nation and that’s the difference. This (Hezbollah) is not a legitimate organization, this is a terrorist organization. But by destroying infrastructure they (the Israelis) are driving moderate Muslims into the arms of Hezbollah.” (The Australian, Monday July 24, 2006). Jan Egeland, UN Commissioner on Humanitarian Affairs went a step further, saying that Israel’s bombing of civilian infrastructure could be a violation of international humanitarian law.

Root Cause

The diagnosis is deeply flawed on both sides of the divide. The Bush Administration is in error when it asserts that the ‘root cause’ of the problem is Hezbollah, and the support extended to it by Iran and Syria. Hamas, Hezbollah and Iran are also wrong when they claim that the root cause of the problem is the very founding and existence of the state of Israel - and refuse to recognize its right to exist. Israel does exist and is not going away, nor can it be destroyed. Refusal to recognize this reality helps no one’s cause. Israel was established in 1948 by a decision of the United Nations, and as the clock struck and the moment had arrived, the first person to cross the floor of the Security Council and congratulate the representative of the new-born state was Molotov, Stalin’s Foreign Minister and close associate. The UN however, did not intend Israel to be born with the borders that it wound up enjoying. The Resolution was for two states, one Jewish, the other Palestinian. It was the Arabs who, with an imprudence that was to be characteristic, rejected that solution and whose armies invaded Israel. This gave the new born state the opportunity to advance far beyond the UN envisaged borders, in its counteroffensive. In that initial war for survival, the bulk of Israel’s weapons came from Czechoslovakia and had been sent by Stalin’s USSR.

The root cause of the problem is not Israel’s existence but Israeli aggression, annexation, occupation and colonization of land that does not belong to it, land that belongs to others, who are then turned into second class human beings in what was their homeland. Israel and the USA claim that the present crisis is due to the fact that Hezbollah and Lebanon ignore UN Security Council Resolution 1559 on the deployment of the Lebanese army in that country’s south, which is the northern border of Israel. What then of a much longer standing resolution, UN resolution 242, which calls for Israeli withdrawal from lands occupied in 1967; a withdrawal that not only has not taken place, but in some places has been rendered permanent by Israeli settlements?

More: http://www.asiantribune.com/index.php?q=node/1315

Disclaimer: I am not the author and may or may not agree with some of this POv, but I found it interesting and informative as to its sentiments.

[Why Syzygy]

1. Reads pretty balanced to me.

Everyone gets a piece of the pie > snipped

The Israeli Right, of which Binyamin Netanyahu and Ariel Sharon were the main (if competing) figures, and Palestinian ‘rejectionism’ worked almost in concert to bury the Oslo peace accords. Had Hamas not undermined Shimon Peres’ campaign and suicide-bombed Likud’s Netanyahu into power in the election following Yitzhak Rabin’s murder by a Jewish fanatic; had Yasser Arafat accepted the offer made by President Bill Clinton and acceded to by Israel’s Ehud Barak at Camp David in 2000; had Ariel Sharon not intentionally triggered the Second Intifada by his provocative visit to the Temple Mount (also during an election campaign); had Sharon and Bush not undermined President Arafat and the Palestinian Authority; had the newly elected Hamas administration swiftly accepted the bold new project – including the recognition of the right of Israel to exist- outlined by prestigious Palestinian political prisoners (most notably Marwaan Barghouti) of both Fatah and Hamas; the unarmed civilians of Lebanon, Gaza and Haifa would not be dying today.

[Tom Yossarian Joad]

2. There are some really sensitive folks here on both sides of the issue...

I felt it was as well, but I really don't want to let something like this to devolve into a flame war between the differing DU sanctions.

[mom cat]

3. I think that you meant to say "factions" instead of "sanctions".

Last I saw, the only ones who can sanction anyone here are the admins/mods.
Actually, I thought it was a good article and food for thought.

[Tom Yossarian Joad]

4. Oops. You are absolutely correct!

Thanks!

[Ghost Dog]

5. Yes indeed. Recommended. n/t