The
Final Say
By Eric Margolis
17 July, 2006
Toronto Sun
The Bush administration, Israel
and U.S.-aligned Arab states have been blaming Iran and Syria for igniting
the worst Mideast fighting in many years.
They claim Iran and ally
Syria got Lebanon's political-military movement, Hezbollah, to kidnap
two Israeli soldiers in a patch of disputed border territory. Tehran's
goal, they say, was to divert attention from growing efforts to curtail
its nuclear program. This view has some merit, but is far from the whole
story.
In 1975, I arrived in Beirut
on the first day of Lebanon's 15-year civil war. I accompanied the Israeli
Army when it invaded Lebanon in 1982 and was in Nabatiyah when Israeli
armoured forces shot their way through a Shia religious procession.
This notorious event enflamed
Lebanon's Shia against the Israelis and led to the birth of Hezbollah.
Hezbollah's tough fighters, trained and armed by Iran and Syria, eventually
drove Israeli occupation forces from Lebanon by 2000, becoming the only
Arab military force to ever defeat Israel, shattering the myth of Israeli
military invincibility. Israel vowed revenge on Hezbollah.
Few Americans know Osama
bin Laden cited the 9/11 attacks as payback for Israel's 1982 bombardment
and siege of Beirut that killed up to 18,000 Lebanese and Palestinians
and left the city shattered.
Hezbollah, from my experience,
is no mere cat's paw of Syria and Iran, but a fiercely independent-minded
movement that is Lebanon's dominant political and military force. Though
backed by Tehran and Damascus, Hezbollah pursues its own local interests,
sometimes in opposition to its allies.
Ironically, Hamas in Palestine
is a democratically-elected government now battling the only other Mideast
democracy, Israel. Hezbollah has elected members in Lebanon's ruling
party, including cabinet ministers.
Why did Hezbollah grab Israeli
soldiers and ambush rescuers, knowing Israel's habit of often reacting
to attacks by harsh collective punishment?
Hezbollah's leader, Sheik
Hussein Nasrallah, made clear his attacks were to support the embattled
Palestinians in Gaza, who have been ravaged by Israeli air, land, and
sea attacks after militants kidnapped an Israeli soldier. Hezbollah's
offensive was also aimed at securing release of hundreds of its supporters
and 10,000 Palestinian prisoners held by Israel.
So far, Hezbollah is the
only Arab force that has made even a gesture to help the embattled Palestinians.
The price has been heavy: Israel's destruction of key portions of Lebanon's
infrastructure and hundreds of civilian casualties.
Yet Hezbollah keeps firing
rockets into northern Israel, a futile gesture that only further infuriates
Israelis. Palestinians did the same thing, lobbing homemade rockets
into Israel that brought crushing retaliation. None of these pinprick
attacks served any useful military or political purpose. They give Israel
an excuse to further vent its fury and play to worried voters.
All parties involved are
to blame for this frightful mess: The Palestinians and Hezbollah for
provoking Israel, and Israel for its continuing brutal repression of
Palestinians and assassinating their leaders. But most at blame is the
Bush administration whose catastrophically misguided Mideast policies
have fed this crisis.
The Palestinian-Israeli conflict
lies at the heart of Mideast troubles, and is the primary generator
for anti-Western violence known as terrorism. It is a weary truism that
no nation can bring about Mideast peace except for the United States.
But the Bush administration
has been too obsessed by its losing wars in Iraq and Afghanistan to
pay attention to the Levant. U.S. Mideast policy is dominated by neoconservatives
and Protestant fundamentalists aligned with Israel's expansionist right
wing, leaving would-be peacemakers in Israel and the Arab World out
in the cold.
A green light
The White House has given
Israel a very public green light to go on pounding Lebanon. What deja
vu. In 1982, the Reagan administration also gave Israel's Ariel Sharon
a green light to invade Lebanon. The result was 15 years of mayhem,
the bombing of the U.S. Embassy in Beirut, and Hezbollah.
Israel and its enemies will
eventually talk. It's only a question of how many civilians on both
sides will die before this happens.
Copyright © 2006, Canoe
Inc.