Thanks for nothing

Billmon says: Whiskey Bar: Punching Above Its Weight.

Rockets are still raining on northern Israel (not the alleged 40-mile jobs, but lethal enough.) Hezbollah TV and radio are still on the air. And now they're taking out Israeli ships.

This should give an enormous boost to Hezbollah's prestige and popularity in the Arab world -- just as the initial success of the Egyptian attack across the Suez Canal in '73 helped erase the humiliation of the Six Day War and made Sadat, for a time, a regional hero. That prestige, in turn, could make it more dangerous for "moderate" (i.e. U.S. dominated) Arab countries to move against the group or criticize it publicly. The same goes for Hezbollah's domestic enemies inside Lebanon.

On my last visit to Lebanon in September 2000, I became very concerned about Hizbullah's continuing armed presence in the South, in places just within walking distance of my village. I began talking then and ever since about how the civil war is over and everybody needs to lay down their arms. To me the excuse of Shebaa Farms seemed a very bad one. The Israeli occupation might have given a fig leaf of cover for continued Hizbullah militia but once Israel left Lebanon's South in May 2000, Hizbullah lost its last pretext for carrying arms.

I have been saying for years that the country is not viable and not stable while there is a standing militia still operating outside the central government.

I don't have a problem with Hizbullah participating in elections. Let the elections be fair and see what happens.

So I am proven right by this week's events, but I take no pleasure in it. And just because I'm right doesn't mean that I think it's a good idea for Israel to destroy the infrastructure Lebanon has rebuilt so over the last fifteen years. Not to mention kill people, but we're talking about Arabs here, so the idea that killing Arabs is a bad thing doesn't convince many right-wingers.

My poison pen commenters hate me so much because I'm pointing out the moral stink in the Israeli arguments. Having the semblance of justice and righteousness on their side still matters to some in the Israel-right-or-wrong faction. I think they're so mad that I'm moralising because they know their beloved Israel is not really so pure and holy in this matter.

On the Arab side, already I am feeling the pressure not to criticize Hizbullah in all this. Lebanese bloggers who hate Hizbullah are saying they will hold their fire until this war is over, that while Israel bombs Lebanon they are all united, all Lebanese.

Well I'm an American Lebanese so I don't feel quite so constrained. But I understand the sentiment. I have said several things against Hizbullah and against the Lebanese government's enabling of Hizbullah in the last few days. Now I wonder if it isn't just kicking the Lebanese when they are down. I won't delete the posts. But I am not going to keep cudgeling the Lebanese right now. They are facing death, famine and privation at the moment, they don't need me lecturing them about the dangers of Hizbullah.

Those of you poison pen pals showing up here may want to meet an unnamed relative of mine, who just told me today he wants the Israelis to exterminate Hizbullah. Finish the job, he said. I call that crazy talk, a sign of a lower level of moral development that is actually quite short-sighted - where would you put all the bodies, for one thing? Do you really mean to wipe out whole villages?

My relative gets a pass because a) he's blood and b) he's seen more war than any of you pussies* cowards leaving me nasty notes. War warps people. Also, he doesn't really mean it, he's just trying to see if I'll argue with him.

All I said was "God help us all."

In conclusion - this incursion of 2006 will turn out for Israel about as well as 1982 did. I was only 20 then but I remember it well. Those of you hissing at me in comments don't know much about history. You think you are all such hard-muscled realists, that I'm reprehensible for speaking against the violence. I'll bet most of you have never seen combat. If you are Americans, I invite you please to serve your country and enlist. Channel that bloodthirsty energy. There's a war on in Iraq, you probably support it, and our troops need boots, not lip service and blog posts.

Mindless bloodthirstiness is not the way to security and peace for any of us. I will probably live long enough to be proven right on this, but the price of being right will be too high: death and chaos in Lebanon and maybe the wider Middle East. I would rather not be right. I would rather have peace and security. So far the Israelis, the neo-conservatives and George Bush have not created peace with their tactics, and I've been waiting all my life.

Billmon is right, Hizbullah wins no matter how many casualties they take. And those of us who are pluralistic, secular, and committed to free discussion and open societies will be pushed farther and farther back into our enclaves, into silence.

Yeah, you big swinging military dicks, thanks for nothing.

*pussies taken out. As a feminist with a deep love for female bodies I don't want to use that word in this pejorative sense. It's using aggressive masculine language to try to sound powerful, and I don't think vaginas deserve such denigration.

You commenters who come by swaggering and attacking me are simple-minded cowards, and I doubt whether any one of you would have the guts to confront me, a middle-aged woman, face to face in conversation, much less suit up and join one of the armies you so slaveringly cheer.

Comments

[Stephen Frug]

Leila, I just wanted to say: Don't let the trolls get you down. I've gotten an enormous amount out of your blog this week; I hope you keep at it. And keep hoping. We need the dove's eye view, especially now.

I don't mean in the least to criticize this response, and I do understand -- I really do, having been trolled in my blogging too -- the anger and frustration that brings it on. By all means be angry if and when you need to. Just don't let it stop you from blogging, from speaking, from thinking -- especially from speaking from a position of hope, thin as that may seem at times.

Let the trolls growl under their bridges. We know that doves have a better view of the landscape.

[Leila]

Hey Stephen, great image (trolls and doves) Thanks.

My kids are calling, I must join real life.

[steve]

War is hell. But Hezbollah is Iran's bitch. Why anyone would even consider them worthy of humane or Geneva Convention treatment is beyond the understanding of this former soldier . . . Hezbollah perfected the hostage crisis and the suicide bomber. Their members deserve to be buried with swine carcases . . . forget about treating them like humans.

I sympathize with the innocent citizens of Lebanon. But I have zero tolerance for Hezbollah's dip-shit mindset or their shenanigans over the last two decades . . .

[Robert]

Just got here, thanks for the links at Gilliard's. It's as bad as I thought.

As for the trolls? I know stupidity hurts, but you have to let it slide off like water off a duck's back. These moral reprobates have nothing and are nothing except hatred and lashing out. Unfortunately there are a lot of them, which has led to our present circumstances.

Sorry, not as encouraging as I meant it to come out. Just don't let them shut down your voice. Now more than ever we need people like you to give us the facts on the ground.

[Daryl Herbert]

No matter what the circumstances, Israel's enemies always trot out the old "Israel-right-or-wrong" line, as if Israelis and supporters abroad haven't been some of the most introspective, self-doubting people in the world. Israel is the only country in the Middle East with a strong "peace" movement.

As if there is anything similar in the Arab world. The people with power in the Arab world don't address questions of morality. Do you think Saudi Arabia criticized Hezbollah because their "adventure" is immoral, or because it threatens to lead to a major Arab defeat? These are the same murderous Arabs who cheered in the streets for suicide bombers who hit civilian targets--and sent money to buy more bombs.

The whole point of pulling out of Lebanon and Gaza was to prove to the world that, when the Arabs attacked Israel again, Israel could claim the moral high ground (and we all knew Arabs couldn't help themselves, they would definitely attack again). Sharon was not stupid. Some right-wingers did criticize him for that--anyone who would deny the existence of a few right-wing crazies in Israel is dishonest--but the pullout happened, because the hard right Israel-right-or-wrong river-to-the-sea faction isn't as strong as Israel haters like to pretend. It's much easier to caricature Israelis as rabid Zionist modern orthodox gun-toting settlers, than to face the fact that Israel is a sophisticated nation full of educated, thoughtful people who can each kick 10 Arabs' asses.

Israel pulled out of Lebanon, and Lebanon still kidnapped Israelis. Israel's right, Lebanon's wrong, and Lebanon will pay the price until it does the right thing, regardless what 1 billion Muslims and 1 billion peace weenies around the world think.

I see you've decided to join the Hezbollah-right-or-wrong-until-Lebanon-is-destroyed faction. Ironic that you claim to have any sort of affinity for Lebanon, if you want it to fight a losing war for... the right to carry out unprovoked acts of war against Israel. And you claim to be a "dove." Pathetic.

[mac]

Simple answer--you Lebs, particularly Muzzy Lebs, didn't do what was necessary to stop your country from being in the middle of a nasty fight. You needed to get rid of the Syrians and those Hezb bastards so those on your territory would only be responsible for your own actions. You didn't and now it's coming home to roost. The Israelis got out of S. Leb. That was your chance to disarm Hezb. You chose not to. Your decision. Yours. When you start throwing blame around for this one, start first with the face you see each morning in the mirror.

[bobby_b]

Not sure why this is important before I can speak, but you say it is, and it's your board, so:

War and battle cred: SE Asia. Grunt, dropped off frequently by loud rotary craft into bad places. Shots and frags and booms all aimed at me. Things to step on, wounded asian guys crying for aid and exploding as we knelt. Brains on my shirt. Pete's brains. Bill's arm. Ever carry more than five blown-off feet to a loach at once? I did. Fun part is, which one is pete's? Promised Helen I'd bring him back, so got all psyched about finding a part. Never did figure that one out. No DNA back then.

Is that sufficient?

(Sorry, but that's a stupid threshhold for commenting on war. That all made me no more smarter or qualified to hold an opinion than did law school. That's just an arbitrary way of saying "I know more than you, so shut up." No, you don't. You have no idea.)

If the anti-Israel people were, like, selling kumquats for a WAY INFLATED PRICE in order to hurt the Israeli kumquat industry, well, that's a subject for consideration and debate and compromise.

Instead, they're trying to blow Israeli bodies into small hairy paper bags full of blood. That goes a bit beyond market pressure.

You say "Finish the job, he said. I call that crazy talk, a sign of a lower level of moral development that is actually quite short-sighted - where would you put all the bodies, for one thing? Do you really mean to wipe out whole villages?"

I say, sure. Who's gonna be left to complain about the smell?

After so many years of complete dedication to death, let them experience it. Maybe they'll moderate their views? Can you think of anything else that will cause them to stop? Should they experience success out of their constant murderous attacks?

Get a moral basis. A practical basis is a good thing, but only when there's a moral foundation. Otherwise, it's just one day of bloody stupidity, repeated over and over and over . . .

[bgates]

If you've been waiting your whole life for George Bush to create peace, you've unusually young.

If you think the onus is completely on Bush, neocons, and Israel to create peace, you're typically Arab.

[Nathan Crane]

"So far the Israelis, the neo-conservatives and George Bush have not created peace with their tactics, and I've been waiting all my life."

Yes, but then, neither did the doves, Clinto, Carter, the pull backs, the prisoner releases or Oslo, the roadmaps or ....

So peace doesn't work, war doesn't work, what will work? Or perhaps the point is that peace requires everyone to be willing. Why do you think WWI and WWII lasted so long? As long as one party still has the will, no one can stop.

[JAF]

Hi Leila,
I'm a right winger and I hate war. I understand that there are times for it, and unfortunately, it may be time for Israel to go to war. I don't like it, I don't like the fact that many innocents will die. I hate it, but I understand Israel's desire to live in peace without dodging rockets, kidnappings, suicide bombings. I also understand that the majority in Lebanon would rather live in peace and a free and democratic society. I pray for peace for both Lebanon and Israel. And if hezbollah is the cancer that prevents that, then I pray that it will be defeated.
God Bless us all.

[Omri]

You're right about one thing. I'll attack you here, but let's keep it substantive, shall we? You want to moralize. Well, we all do sometimes. It's generally enjoyable and sometimes the right thing to do. But it's good to have a moral ground from which to do so.

Your fellow Lebanese are deciding to close ranks with Hezbollah. Bad move. Ain't you guys ever heard the phrase "last refuge of scoundrels"? You see, apropos, when Hezbollah started this little shindig, they listed people they want released. At the top, the very top, was their hero, Samir Kuntar. Bad move. You see, Samir Kuntar earned their admiration by crushing the skull of a 4 year old girl with his rifle butt.

So, when they close ranks around Hezbollah, and therefore around Kuntar, the Lebanese are gathering around somewhere that is not exactly a moral high ground. Moral sewer is more like it. Take a deep breath and ponder the scent. Do you want to be here?

But, oh, it gets worse. See, by invoking Kuntar, Hezbollah is provoking the response you think to be dick-waving. But it isn't dick waving. This isn't alpha male dynamics you're seeing from Israel. This is the parental instinct kicking in. We're not waving our dicks. We're baring our teeth.

Moralizing isn't going to be effective. You might want to go back to your playbook and find something else to try.

[Interested Conservative]

Interesting blog and set of comments. If I may, let me try to express what Bobby B is saying with none of the emotion or confrontation.

Here's a favorite old quote from a largely ignored president:

"Never go out to meet trouble. If you will just sit still, nine cases out of ten someone will intercept it before it reaches you."

Again - to pick up on Bobby's comment - I think this is the tenth case. Unfortunately, it's also about the tenth time Israel has faced a tenth case.

[jim the arbiter]

Dove? (Can I call you Dove?)

You're standing on the stairs to the Room of Power. Good people need to get into that Room and kill that Power. You're claiming some moral sanction that should, I guess, make them give up and go away.

Problem is, the Prime Moral Directive calls for you to help them. The Lesser Prime calls for you to get out of their way. Your stated preference seems to fall somewhere below "but I like the atmosphere at Belzec, what right do you have to disturb me?"

Can you do that - get out of the way? - or at least stop bitching that evil as we know it might be ended soon at the cost of your pleasure and comfort?

[bobby_b]

Omri:

I can't do this anymore without the confrontation, so thanks for picking up the slack.

I hate to lose the message in the anger, but I'm not sure anymore which is more important to communicate. The message has done no good for so long . . .

[bobby_b]

Basic inability to read comment tags.

Should have been addressed to Interested Conservative.

[M. Simon]

The Hezb could have given back the prisoners and ended this almost at once. But no, they have to prove they are rocket scientists.

Now the Israelis will not leave until the whole nest of vipers is cleaned out.

You clean out the pests yourself or you can complain when your neighbor brings in the flame throwers.

=========================

This is like suicide by policeman. Hezb is using the Israelis against you.

This is SOP for the Middle East especially the Palestinians.
http://powerandcontrol.blogspot.com/2006/07/war-on-palestinian-people.html

[al]

Everybody want piece!
BUT How at all you can make piece with those who do not want you to exist? What kind of negotiations possible with those who want to kill you? Negotiate how and when you will be killed? Difference between Israel and Hezbollah is that Israel defend itself (rightfully or wrongly) and Hezbollah has a GOAL Israel ’s out of the map.
And stop picking on Bush, granted, he does his part of stupid things. But who started all this mess called Oslo which ended up with intifada and , eventually with 9/11? Who brought Arafat from exile ? Great politician Clinton who wasted precious decade after collapse of USSR on oral sex in oval office and on defending alkaida on Balkans form Serbs by bombing Belgrade and embassy of China

[TonyGuitar]

Iran, Syria and others have poked at Isreal for 32 years using you as a door mat.

You are not happy with Hezbollah shooting at Israel and so they return fire upon Lebanese people and their homes and businesses.

Hezbollah should attack from Iran and face the music like men.

Instead it is Lebanon who suffers the backlash of Hezbollah attacks and not Iran and Syria.

Time to send Hezbollah back home where they can fight at their, not your expense. TG

[Peter]

What I don't understand is why you guys think the 2006 invasion of southern Lebanon will be more effective than the 1982-2000 invasion and occupation. Was Ariel Sharon not militaristic enough as head of the IDF back then?

[Cee]

Maybe we have something to look forward to.

The End of Zionism

Few people recognize it, but, after the fact, it will be obvious to everyone. Zionism is immolating itself in the refugee camps of Gaza and the Shia communities of Lebanon, and no attempt to relegitimize it as a bulwark against Islamic fundamentalism can salvage it. Israel's military operations in Gaza and Lebanon are rapidly hastening its demise.

Continue
http://amleft.blogspot.com/archives/2006_07_01_amleft_archive.html#115221188360937790

[Ure Kismet]

Amazin'. The zionists and their fundie xtian fanboys are gonna get more hysterical as their meglomaniacal delusions are seen for what they are by more and more humans.

That is the fantasies of small dicked rednecks so blinded by prejudice they can't see the game has changed, the days of doing as they want in the ME are over.

You see threats only work if they remain threats. As soon as the seppos actually put boots on the ground in Iraq it was pretty much game over, because as the brits found out a century before once you engage your opponent on pretty much equal terms bluster and bullshit means nothing because it's down the the man who wants to win the most.

In Iraq that is the Iraqis, they are defending their homes against invaders and no one wants to win more than a man defending his country.

Israel learned a similar lesson in the Yom Kippur war. When they had to front up against Egyptians who were as well resourced as they were and who were defending their country against zionist invaders they fought hard they fought well and they prevailed. Big daddy Seppo had to jump in real fast and get the UN to help them halt that mistake.

Ever since them the generals who run the zionist apartheid state have been careful not to attack another sovereign nation. The slipped into Lebanon, but only when it was a failed state broken by civil war. The presence of the zionists gave all Lebanese an enemy in common and as soon as they got sorted once more they chased the zionist front for the failing amerikan empire out with the old cold steel/hot lead enema.

Now we come to the past few weeks where Olmert the time server and first non former IDF leader Prime Minister in a generation or more has spun out of control with his hysterical knee jerk attacks on Palestine then Lebanon.

A war on two fronts when sugar daddy 'merika is scraping the money to stay in one piece in Iraq? That's not what you would call 'good strategic planning'.

And Olmert is going to have to find ways to keep upping the ante.
By doing the worst he can do straight away the people of Lebanon and Palestine have nothing more to fear. Things can't get any worse than they are and as Lila pointed out the Lebanese people who had been feuding so much that some were even worried civil war may break out again, are now drawing together. Same, same in Palestine. When you're a Hamas man ducking for cover with a Fatah man, you are brothers in that hole praying for the rocket to miss.

This isn't about politics or religion. It is about what wars have always been about. Having enough for you and your family.

The people of the middle east turned back to Islam when they found that as 'capitalism' was a cloak for USuk to steal from them 'socialism' was a cloak for russians to do the same.

Islam is their's and can hold them together as they chase the Iraqi invaders back to Texas and Torquay and the Palestinian invaders back to Brooklyn and Minsk.

[TM Lutas]

In any normal country at peace, a military man under orders can wear his uniform and drive from one end of the country to another openly and under arms. When he can't do that, it's called civil war. Could a Lebanese military man do that? I think not.

The peace you talk about was illusory. Lebanon has been an idiot for claiming responsibility for actions taken in a territory it does not and cannot control. The price of that idiocy is being paid right now. Either run the Lebanese army down to the border of Israel or draw a new southern border and let Hezbollah take formally take responsibility for the territory it already controls.

[palamedes]

Leila:

Keep up the good work. Ignore the trolls...most of them wouldn't spend a night in my American hometown under lock and key with a police patrol spending the night on their block, let alone a combat situation.

TG:

Hezbollah exists because of opportunity and repression. Lebanon fixed their last set of problems in the late 1950s/early 1960s by making sure that each ethnic/religous faction would get seats in their national legislature proportionate to their population. Over time, the Marionites, or at least a faction of same, didn't want the Shiites in Lebanon to get more seats, as was their due - their population, relative to the other factions, grew to become a larger fraction of the overall population.

When legitimate, peaceful means of protest and change failed, violent means were tried.

When further suppressed by Fatah and the Southen Lebanese Army, the Shiites in south Lebanon in general, and Hezbollah in particular, learned how to create an independent infrastructure that it's followers can rely on. This new war with Israel will probably push their reliance more into the Eritrian War of Independence levels, with greater mobility of that infrastructure.

Hezbollah is also quite good at using media (as oppposed to "the media") to promote their cause. While most look at their bomb attacks and ambush attempts widely available on videotape as unnerving, they know it attracts adherents. Thus the drone attack on an Israeli naval vessel (and a merchant vessel by mistake). They'll probably not be able to repeat it, but the propoganda effect is substantial.

There's no love lost between myself and Hezbollah, but without comprehension of an opponent, you can neither defeat it or negotiate with it. And the odds are that Israel and the Lebanese government (or at least the present leadership of each) will have to learn how to do the latter once they realize what it wil take to accomplish the former.

[JAF]

""""That is the fantasies of small dicked rednecks so blinded by prejudice they can't see the game has changed, the days of doing as they want in the ME are over.""""

You mean like Israel wanting to exist?

""""In Iraq that is the Iraqis, they are defending their homes against invaders and no one wants to win more than a man defending his country.""""

Actually, it seems that a minority of the country is fighting for their long lost right to rule over the majority.

Thats just the way I see it. God bless us all and pray for peace.

[JAF]

""""The people of the middle east turned back to Islam when they found that as 'capitalism' was a cloak for USuk to steal from them 'socialism' was a cloak for russians to do the same.""""

Not sure what is being stolen. I wouldn't exactly call $76 per barrel stealing.