From the always-interesting site ‘democracyarsenal’ (not known for its generous helpings of Bush-love), an interesting post by Shadi Hamid.
Hezbollah knew that any attack on Israel would elicit a forceful response, particularly in light of Israel’s sustained efforts to recover abducted soldier Gilad Shalit the previous week. Any intelligent person could have predicted that Israel would do everything in its power to destroy Hezbullah infrastructure if provoked along the border. Sure, there are short-term strategic gains which may yet accrue to Hezbollah, but in the long run, the group’s organizational capacity has been severely hit and, now, its continued existence as the second strongest political force in Lebanon (along with coalition partners Amal) is a big question-mark. If Hezbollah’s goal was, in fact, to force Israel into a prisoner exhange, then killing eight soldiers makes absolutely no sense. Nasrallah might very well be a raging megalomaniac but I’m not sure that, by itself, explains Hezbollah’s strategic self-immolation.
A strategic setback for Hizbollah sounds like a victory for Israel, no? How else can it be interpreted?
Some Egyptians I have spoken to here, in between tiresome praises of Nasrallah, claim to understand it quite well – that Hezbollah did this for karamah, to reclaim Arab world’s dignity (the destruction of one’s country would seem a rather exorbitant price to pay for regaining one’s “dignity”). Or, as someone else suggested – it’s every militant Islamist group’s dream to drag the world into some kind or regional conflagration, where Arabs will be forced to get up or sit down (although the vast majority of Arabs have been sitting down rather consistently for the last five decades). Read Michael Doran’s “Somebody Else’s Civil War” for a sense of how this set-up might work. (Interestingly, Doran is now the point-person for the Middle East on the National Security Council).
Interesting to see the man who ran Muslims for Kerry making an approving comment about Bush’s NSC staff choices, too…
An interesting piece.
Or, alternately, Hezbollah might have just plain screwed up and let some bloodthirsty moron do the planning of what was supposed to be a less-prominent op.
Then, of course, they had to pretend otherwise to save face.
Given the Arab propensity for turning major losses and defeats into “victories”, I doubt Hezbollah’s thrashing will be viewed as anything but yet another victory over the “Zionist Oppressors” regardless of their near total annihilation.
Case in point: Egypt still celebrates the Yom Kippur war as a major victory. Fun Fact: Anwar Saddat was assassinated during one of the post war “victory parades”.
Hezbollah has been planning this for years, and Israel has been planning its response to a Hezbollah attack for a year or greater. None of this comes as a surprise to Israel, it was fully expected, and they have been working on the invasion plan well in advance.
Self delusion is part and parcel of the Arab psyche.
Never underestimate the f*cknuttery of your enemies.
From Iraq The Model
I didn’t totally buy Nasrallah starting a war with Israel because Iran wanted heat off on the nuclear question. Inflaming a regional war with a large US force on your southern boundary smacked of Saddam’s error in not waiting to invade Kuwait until he had nukes. Now, I’m not so sure.
Interesting – I was concerned about using the word *nuttery, but the questionable content went off on bl*gspot. The link above needs to be fixed in the address line if you try it.
jdwill (#4):
One can use “www.tinyurl.com”:http://www.tinyurl.com to generate a tiny URL for links to the Host Whose Name Must Not Be Mentioned. For example, “here”:http://tinyurl.com/g94ua is a link to the Iraq the Model post you reference.
Amac
Cool. Thanks.
I think we are on the verge of an atomic war.
Ahmanut job keeps promising them by 22 Aug.
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About three or four years ago Israel was in a position and had a casus belli to attack Syria. I believe they made a big mistake by not pulling the trigger.
They will have to do the job now under more adverse circumstances.
Israel can lose despite the destruction of Hezbollah if:
1) They are suckered into an occupation of any part of Lebanon, (or)
2) They accidentally or intentionally overthrow al-Assad.