Monday, July 24, 2006

How can the IDF avoid hurting the Lebanese infrastructure?

Anton Efendi points to an eye-opening article in Le-Figaro, showing how deeply Iran is involved in the current conflict. (And here's another interesting post hinting at this involvement).

Some of the user comments to Anton's post criticize Israel's attacks on civilian infrastructure.

According to the IDF, the Hezbolla are using the civilian infrastructure in Lebanon for their own purposes. This IDF video shows Hezbolla firing rockets from *within* a Lebanese village. According to claims I heard on Israeli radio - Hezbolla sometimes hides the rocket launchers inside people's garages! Their attacks are aimed not only at Israeli infrastructure: they are purposely targeting Israeli civilians, and are using weapons that are designed to harm as many people as possible.

The instinctive response of most Israelis to Hezbolla's attacks is unequivocal support for the IDF's actions in Lebanon. However, I personally agree that the damaging of Lebanese infrastructure breeds hatred toward Israel, and will have a long term price. The question is: can Israel avoid harming Lebanese infrastructure, and how many Israeli lives will such avoidance cost?

2 comments:

Israeli Blogger said...

EngineeringChange,

I agree that in the long term, there is no military solution. And I also agree with your comment on Across the Bay that *purposely targeting* civilians is plain wrong. I certainly hope that the IDF is NOT purposely targeting civilians.

In the short term, though, are you proposing that the IDF stop trying to disable Hezbolla's rockets? I don't believe any country in the world could sit idly by as its citizens are being shelled with thousands of rockets!

BTW, I see that officials in the UN are finally starting to realize this point. See the AP news release U.N. Exec Blames Hezbollah for Deaths.

Israeli Blogger said...

EngineeringChange,

Again - we are in agreement. I too suspect that the IDF is currently "light on the trigger" with targets. Still - from a helicopter, it is really difficult to tell a minivan full of children from a minivan full of guerilla fighters with anti-aircraft missiles (an Apache pilot told me once about the experience of flying over Lebanon. It's not for the faint of heart). Also, what newspapers call a milk factory might in reality be a milk factory - but I wouldn't bet my life on it. So we come again to Hizballa's use of civilian cover as major underlying cause of these tragic events.

As for your question about the right of return: it's a really good question. I'd like to dedicate a full post to it, so please look for my answer on the blog itself.