Soccer Dad

Klein-halevi on israel's next war

In 2001, Yossi Klein-Halevi wrote a bleak assessment of Israel's situation "State of Despair." (The New Republic, August 6, 2001)

It's been ten months of unrelenting low-level war, and, in one sense, we're coping better than expected. While the intifada of the late '80s divided Israel bitterly, this time we're united. Yasir Arafat has restored to us a confidence in our basic justness. Most Israelis agree on what has happened: Twice the world has tried to resolve the Palestinian problem--in 1947 and in 2000--and twice the Jewish national movement has said yes and the Palestinian national movement has said no.

But the unity conceals a creeping fear about Israel's survival. The fear is not quite about war--according to a recent poll, 76 percent of Israelis believe we will win a regional conflict. It is vaguer and deeper than that. Not since the time before the Six Day War, when Israel faced seemingly insurmountable security and economic crises, have Israelis questioned the long-term viability of the Jewish state. An old Jewish fatalism has seeped in. According to the poll, two-thirds of Israelis don't believe peace is possible. Nearly half have curtailed their lifestyles since the intifada began and report greater tension and depression. In conversations in recent weeks with Israelis across the country, especially in border areas, the phrase I heard most often was "We're losing the state."

It took a war (Operation Defensive Shield) and hundreds of deaths, but Israel restored order. Now, however, things must seem bleak again. Terrorist groups have violated Isreali territory, killed a number of Israeli soldiers and kidnapped three others. Israel is now responding harshly. The little old ladies of the media have no patience for Israel defending itself, but it's what must be done.

Now Yossi Klein Halevi writes about Israel's Next War (registration required)

The next Middle East war--Israel against genocidal Islamism--has begun. The first stage of the war started two weeks ago, with the Israeli incursion into Gaza in response to the kidnapping of an Israeli soldier and the ongoing shelling of Israeli towns and kibbutzim; now, with Hezbollah's latest attack, the war has spread to southern Lebanon. Ultimately, though, Israel's antagonists won't be Hamas and Hezbollah but their patrons, Iran and Syria. The war will go on for months, perhaps several years. There may be lulls in the fighting, perhaps even temporary agreements and prisoner exchanges. But those periods of calm will be mere respites.

The goals of the war should be the destruction of the Hamas regime and the dismantling of the Hezbollah infrastructure in southern Lebanon. Israel cannot coexist with Iranian proxies pressing in on its borders. In particular, allowing Hamas to remain in power--and to run the Palestinian educational system--will mean the end of hopes for Arab-Israeli reconciliation not only in this generation but in the next one too.

Of course this has been the case for quite awhile. Palestinian terrorism has been the proxy weapon of the Arab war against Israel. (And Palestinian grievance have been the means by which this war has been legitimized.)

However I can't agree with the next part

For the Israeli right, this is the moment of "We told you so." The fact that the kidnappings and missile attacks have come from southern Lebanon and Gaza--precisely the areas from which Israel has unilaterally withdrawn--is proof, for right-wingers, of the bankruptcy of unilateralism. Yet the right has always misunderstood the meaning of unilateral withdrawal. Those of us who have supported unilateralism didn't expect a quiet border in return for our withdrawal but simply the creation of a border from which we could more vigorously defend ourselves, with greater domestic consensus and international understanding. The anticipated outcome, then, wasn't an illusory peace but a more effective way to fight the war. The question wasn't whether Hamas or Hezbollah would forswear aggression but whether Israel would act with appropriate vigor to their continued aggression.

Not having the boots on the ground in Gaza has made it harder to defend against attacks emanating from there. Of course it didn't help that Israel didn't make much of an effort to do so.

So it wasn't the rocket attacks that were a blow to the unilateralist camp, but rather Israel's tepid responses to those attacks. If unilateralists made a mistake, it was in believing our political leaders--including Ariel Sharon and Ehud Olmert--when they promised a policy of zero tolerance against any attacks emanating from Gaza after Israel's withdrawal. That policy was not implemented--until two weeks ago. Now, belatedly, the Olmert government is trying to regain something of its lost credibility, and that is the real meaning of this initial phase of the war, both in Gaza and in Lebanon.

Or will the international objections that are now starting to be heard stay their collective hand?

The ultimate threat, though, isn't Hezbollah or Hamas but Iran. And as Iran draws closer to nuclear capability--which the Israeli intelligence community believes could happen this year--an Israeli-Iranian showdown becomes increasingly likely. According to a very senior military source with whom I've spoken, Israel is still hoping that an international effort will stop a nuclear Iran; if that fails, then Israel is hoping for an American attack. But if the Bush administration is too weakened to take on Iran, then, as a last resort, Israel will have to act unilaterally. And, added the source, Israel has the operational capability to do so.

As noted above this has always been the case. Israel's occupation of Lebanon legitimized Iran and Syria's war from the north. Israel's occupation of Judea, Smaria and Gaza legitimized the PLO's war from the center and south. Now Israel cannot put off a response any longer. Let's hope that it doesn't fall short.

UPDATE: Shiloh Musings doesn't think much of the NY Times advice to Israel either

That's not how you win a war. It just fans the flame of terrorism.

Israel Matzav agrees with us

You got that folks? It's okay for us to go into Gaza to rescue one soldier who is being held hostage by Hamas, but not to rescue hundreds of thousands of Israelis who are being held hostage to the constant pitter patter of rockets raining down that are being shot by Hamas? Something is very wrong with that equation.

Technorati tags: Lebanon, Israel, Gaza, Hamas, Hezbollah.

Posted by SoccerDad at July 13, 2006 5:07 AM