It’s really all over but the lieing. Prime Minister Olmert says
Israel will stay in South Lebanon until "a robust international force"
arrives to dismantle Hezbollah.
Not happening. America doesn’t have the troops. Europe doesn’t have the
will. No other countries have the capacity to disarm a large guerilla
force against the will of the Lebanese people.
This is the main point of failure. Rather than causing Lebanese people to take the Israeli side and dismantle Hezbollah, every report I’ve seen says that even Christian Lebanese now hate Israel more.
Which leaves occupation. How long can Israel occupy south Lebanon? Not
very long. The country has already thrown in its reserves. It can’t
keep those people in the field without damaging the economy. It can’t
keep damaging the economy without degrading its ability to keep people
in the field.
Both sides miscalculated. Hezbollah underestimated the Israeli national
will. But Israel overestimated its own capability. If Syria enters the
fray, or the West Bank explodes (as Gaza has) what can Israel do? What else does it have?
And without that aura of invincibility how can Israel survive?
I think Israelis, including Olmert, know all this. I think they’re
posturing, refusing to admit the obvious. Just as American officials
have been posturing for 3 1/2 years over Iraq. But we’ve got a bigger
economy than they do.
Sure, America may step up its aid and give Israel the money it needs to
keep going. But that makes Israel an American colony. I don’t think
Israelis want that. And right now that’s the best-case scenario.
I don’t have advice. I’m looking for advice. I don’t want Israel
destroyed, but this is the road Israel has chosen and I don’t think it
leads anywhere good.
End of transmission.
Here’s an entry from Phil Greenspun’s blog that I’d like to see you comment on:
I don’t generally follow news from the Middle East because so little truly new happens there. The Lebanese/Israeli conflict of recent weeks has caught my attention, however. I’m pretty sure that it is the first time in more than 1000 years that a non-governmental group of non-Jews has attacked a group of Jews and suffered in any way. For more than 1000 years in Europe and the Arab world, mob violence against Jews was a harmless diversion, at least for the Christians and Muslims. Oftentimes, the non-Jews would profit handsomely from their efforts, at least in the short run, by being able to occupy houses vacated by Jews, taking Jewish property, and confiscating Jewish bank accounts. The closest that non-Jews ever came to suffering any negative consequence from a pogrom was Kristallnacht in Germany, November 9, 1938. The Christian Germans on the rampage had a lot of fun, but the Christian-owned insurance companies afterwards complained that they would have to pay for the thousands of shops destroyed. Fortunately, the German government ordered the Jews themselves to pay for the damage. (A recent book on Jews who survived Auschwitz but were killed by their Polish neighbors upon returning home shows that even after WWII there were essentially no negative consequences for mob violence by European Christians against Jews.)
One might argue that the Palestinians have suffered for their attacks on Jews, but they never did suffer significantly for the mob violence that they inflicted on Jews before 1948. Any suffering of the Palestinians since 1948 has been primarily due to their being caught in the middle of a pan-Arab war that they had little part in starting. The Syrian, Jordanian, and Egyptian armies have also had difficulties at the hands of the Israelis, but these were professional soldiers sent by their governments and the average citizens of Amman, Cairo, or Damascus have not been displaced from their homes at any time during the 60-year war.
Lebanon 2006 offers a completely different experience of Jew-hatred and violence against Jews. A substantial subset of Lebanese citizens decides that they would like to kill Jews and that therefore it would be fun to launch some rockets into the residential neighborhoods of Israel. They expect to enjoy this activity for many months or years. Most of what they’ve read about Jews in school and in newspapers comes from old educational materials translated from the German. Jews are weak. Jews operate in secret committees behind the scenes. Certainly if they have studied history they’ve learned that when a Muslim mob attacks a community of Jews, it is invariably the Jews who end up having to flee Baghdad. Tehran, or Morocco or wherever, leaving their homes and property behind.
What happened this time? The Jews, armed to the teeth, came over to where the rockets were being fired and made the place unlivable. The Lebanese who thought they would be sitting in their living rooms watching Jews die on their television sets were forced to flee to the north or to Cyprus. This is a truly unprecedented situation.
[Of course, many Lebanese who never fired a rocket are suffering the consequences of their fellow citizens’ actions, but military conflict hasn’t gotten a whole lot more precise since King George III observed to Parliament on October 27, 1775, that he was “anxious to prevent, if it had been possible, the effusion of the blood of my subjects; and the calamities which are inseparable from a state of war”]
Here’s an entry from Phil Greenspun’s blog that I’d like to see you comment on:
I don’t generally follow news from the Middle East because so little truly new happens there. The Lebanese/Israeli conflict of recent weeks has caught my attention, however. I’m pretty sure that it is the first time in more than 1000 years that a non-governmental group of non-Jews has attacked a group of Jews and suffered in any way. For more than 1000 years in Europe and the Arab world, mob violence against Jews was a harmless diversion, at least for the Christians and Muslims. Oftentimes, the non-Jews would profit handsomely from their efforts, at least in the short run, by being able to occupy houses vacated by Jews, taking Jewish property, and confiscating Jewish bank accounts. The closest that non-Jews ever came to suffering any negative consequence from a pogrom was Kristallnacht in Germany, November 9, 1938. The Christian Germans on the rampage had a lot of fun, but the Christian-owned insurance companies afterwards complained that they would have to pay for the thousands of shops destroyed. Fortunately, the German government ordered the Jews themselves to pay for the damage. (A recent book on Jews who survived Auschwitz but were killed by their Polish neighbors upon returning home shows that even after WWII there were essentially no negative consequences for mob violence by European Christians against Jews.)
One might argue that the Palestinians have suffered for their attacks on Jews, but they never did suffer significantly for the mob violence that they inflicted on Jews before 1948. Any suffering of the Palestinians since 1948 has been primarily due to their being caught in the middle of a pan-Arab war that they had little part in starting. The Syrian, Jordanian, and Egyptian armies have also had difficulties at the hands of the Israelis, but these were professional soldiers sent by their governments and the average citizens of Amman, Cairo, or Damascus have not been displaced from their homes at any time during the 60-year war.
Lebanon 2006 offers a completely different experience of Jew-hatred and violence against Jews. A substantial subset of Lebanese citizens decides that they would like to kill Jews and that therefore it would be fun to launch some rockets into the residential neighborhoods of Israel. They expect to enjoy this activity for many months or years. Most of what they’ve read about Jews in school and in newspapers comes from old educational materials translated from the German. Jews are weak. Jews operate in secret committees behind the scenes. Certainly if they have studied history they’ve learned that when a Muslim mob attacks a community of Jews, it is invariably the Jews who end up having to flee Baghdad. Tehran, or Morocco or wherever, leaving their homes and property behind.
What happened this time? The Jews, armed to the teeth, came over to where the rockets were being fired and made the place unlivable. The Lebanese who thought they would be sitting in their living rooms watching Jews die on their television sets were forced to flee to the north or to Cyprus. This is a truly unprecedented situation.
[Of course, many Lebanese who never fired a rocket are suffering the consequences of their fellow citizens’ actions, but military conflict hasn’t gotten a whole lot more precise since King George III observed to Parliament on October 27, 1775, that he was “anxious to prevent, if it had been possible, the effusion of the blood of my subjects; and the calamities which are inseparable from a state of war”]