Defending the Holy Land: A Critical Analysis of Israel's Security and Foreign Policy

Afterword: The Second Lebanon Fiasco and the Never-Ending Intifada

Afterword: The Second Lebanon Fiasco and the Never-Ending Intifada 1. the second lebanon war, july–august 2006 On July 12, 2006, a well-planned attack of the Hizballah on an IDF convoy inside northern Israel resulted in the killing of three Israeli soldiers and the kidnapping of an additional two. A unit that attempted to chase the kidnappers ran into another ambush, and the clash resulted in an additional ‹ve Israeli fatalities and a destroyed tank (Vinograd 2007, 66). Israel’s response was quick and harsh. The IAF launched a massive attack at Lebanese infrastructural targets in the Beirut area, targeting power stations , bridges, and buildings in Beirut that had been suspected to be Hizballah communications centers (Shelah and Limor 2007, 61; Harel and Issacharoff 2008, 172–73). Thus started the Second Lebanon War, a war that lasted 34 days, resulting in 1,500 Lebanese and 159 Israeli fatalities . More important, during this period, Hizballah ‹red 3,990 Katyusha rockets at Israeli population centers, some of them hitting as far as the city of Hadera, 120 kilometers south of the Israel-Lebanon border. During the war, a third of Israel’s population and about the same proportion of Lebanon’s population ›ed their houses and became refugees in their own country. The economy of both societies was badly damaged by the ‹ghting .1 After a month of intense ‹ghting, the UN Security Council issued Resolution 1701, which called for a cease-‹re and the pullout of Israeli troops from South Lebanon. This resolution expanded the mandate and 621 the size of UNIFIL in South Lebanon and called on the Lebanese government to send the Lebanese army to South Lebanon and disarm the Hizballah. The situation in the ensuing two years in that border area can be best characterized as a tense stalemate, with both sides actively preparing for yet another round of ‹ghting but neither breaking the cease-‹re agreement. The Israeli public offered almost unequivocal support to the government at the outbreak of the war, but as the war prolonged and as the Katyushas kept dropping, support dwindled. Polls run during the war showed that as much as 97 percent of the Israeli public saw the war as justi‹ed on July 19—a week into the war. This level of support had gone down to 72 percent by August 13—the day the war ended. On the other hand, the public’s evaluation of the government’s performance ›uctuated from 80 percent support at the start of the war to less than 40 percent on August 13. A similar trend characterized the approval ratings of Prime Minister Olmert (from 78 percent approval at the start of the war to 42 percent approval at the end of the war) and of Defense Minister Peretz (from 65 percent approval at the start of the war to 37 percent at the end of the war) (Shavit et al. 2006). Public perceptions of the outcome of the war suggest that only 26 percent of the public viewed the outcome of the war as an Israeli victory, 21 percent perceived it as a Hizballah victory, and another 35 percent interpreted the outcome as favoring neither of the parties. Despite claims by Israeli politicians about signi‹cant accomplishments , the war was a ‹asco. This outcome is stunning given the deluxe nature of the war. Israel enjoyed an overwhelming advantage in capabilities . The government enjoyed widespread public support. From a foreign policy perspective, Israel operated—perhaps for the ‹rst time in its military history—without internationally imposed time constraints. The Bush administration provided it with what amounted to a blank check to continue its military operations for as long as it needed, fending off diplomatic attempts by the international community to put an end to the con›ict. The administration’s hope was that Israel would destroy the Hizballah and deliver a political blow to Iran and Syria, Hizballah’s supporters . This would indirectly help the United States in its war in Iraq and in its broader war on terror (Harel and Issacharoff 2008, 205–8; Shelah and Limor 2007, 88). Nobody in the Arab world lifted a ‹nger to help the Lebanese, beyond mild condemnation of Israel’s actions. Never had Israel enjoyed such favorable international conditions for the conduct of its military operations. UN Resolution 1701 created a potentially stable 622 DEFENDING THE HOLY LAND situation in southern Lebanon, but...