One Year Later – Part II: And Now, Hezbollah…
:וַיֹּאמֶר יְהוָה אֵלָי מִצָּפוֹן תִּפָּתַח הָרָעָה עַל כָּל יֹשְׁבֵי הָאָרֶץ
(ירמיהו א:יד)
I was struck this week by a headline that said “Israel’s Bombardment of Lebanon” as if that told the whole story of this new phase of war.
Make no mistake about it, Israel is fighting an existential war. The reason it can be categorized as existential is that its adversary, Hezbollah – a Shi’ite Islamic fundamentalist terrorist organization and political party that has essentially controlled most of Lebanon since the early 1980s – has stated that its goal is the destruction of Israel. Hezbollah is not fighting in protest of a policy, (e.g., expanding a military buffer zone, Occupation, or anything else), just against the existence of a Jewish state. It has to be understood as well that Hezbollah is a representative of the much more powerful Iran that has predicted that Israel will be destroyed by 2050 – and is actively working towards that outcome. Most Israelis across all political lines acknowledge that a war against Hezbollah is inevitable. Before the recent fighting, the question wasn’t “if” there would be war but “when” there would be war. A tragic reality if there ever was one.
Consistent with that goal, Hezbollah has been bombarding Northern Israel nearly every day since October 8. It has weapons stockpiles that make Hamas seem pale in comparison. As I said above, it forced thousands of people out of their homes and has pushed Israel’s Northern border South by several kilometers.
The last Lebanon War with Hezbollah ended in a ceasefire on August 11, 2006, with the adoption of UN Resolution 1701 that required Hezbollah to vacate southern Lebanon to north of the Litani River.
“Over these 18 years, Hezbollah wasn’t planting trees and building houses in Lebanon [for its people],” said Brigadier General. (reserves) Tzvika Haimovitz, a former commander of Israel’s Air Defense Forces.
According to a March report from the Center for Strategic and International Studies, Hezbollah now has:
- 40-80,000 short-range unguided rockets with ranges up to 20 kilometers (about 12.4 miles)
- 60-80,0000 long-range unguided rockets that can reach 100 kilometers (a little more than 62 miles)
- Hezbollah has up to 40,000 ballistic missiles with ranges from 160-300 kilometers (about 100 to 186 miles)
- A few dozen Scud missiles that can reach 500 kilometers (310.7 miles)
- Several hundred precision Fateh-110 ballistic missiles can deliver a 500 kg warhead up to a range of 300 kilometers (186 miles).
Where is the UN to enforce the ceasefire resolution that it put into place? Nowhere to be seen.
After a year of steady back and forth, Israel has ramped up its response. It allegedly carried out a precision intelligence attack blowing up beepers and pagers that belonged only to Hezbollah terrorists thus intending minimal civilian loss of life. Now Israel is carrying out a precision bombing campaign to inhibit Hezbollah’s ability to further shoot missiles and rockets, one of which reached Tel Aviv this past week(!). Yet, many in the Western media miss or ignore the context in which all this is taking place. How would the United States react if Mexico or Canada were shooting daily deadly rocket and missile attacks across the border at United States families in their homes, at farmers in their fields, and at cities and population centers throughout the country? It’s not a relevant question to them because Israel is so often blamed as the guilty party. Unfairly, Israel is always called upon to exercise restraint despite the fact that there is a heavily armed Iranian and Russian-backed terrorist organization amassed on its border with a steady and constant threat to destroy the Jewish State.
Much of the world’s sympathy has been focused on Lebanese civilians fleeing their villages and cities in fear of Israeli bombing missions. That sympathy is well-placed. But less sympathy has come from the world towards the tens of thousands of Israelis who have fled their homes for months due to the constant bombing and rocket fire from Hezbollah. Mainstream media have accused the collective Israeli psyche of being cloistered in self-protective layers of indignation, while sometimes Hezbollah fighters and supporters have been lauded as being defiant – including those who celebrate in the streets when Israelis are killed.
Of course, diplomacy is almost always preferable to war. It is a tragic consequence of war when Lebanese civilians get hurt and die in the crossfire. Lebanese civilians don’t deserve to die or have their lives destroyed. According to polls, most Lebanese are opposed to Hezbollah. The U.S.-French attempts to broker a cessation of hostilities is laudable. Surely Israel will take heat for rejecting it. But we’ll have to forgive Israel’s skepticism because up until now there has been virtually no international pressure on Hezbollah and Iran to stop its shooting of rockets into Israel. The international media has hardly reported at all about Hezbollah’s constant attacks against Israel over the last 11 months. Reporting in mainstream media has used headlines such as “Israeli Strikes on Lebanon” from the NYT or the popular podcast “Pod Save the World” the thumbnail graphic of which read, “Israel Bombards Lebanon”. As is always the case, one might have to scroll down and read further to understand that according to the Israeli military, Israeli forces struck “buildings [including Lebanese homes] in which Hezbollah hid rockets, missiles, launchers, drones, and additional military infrastructure” much the same way that Hamas hid its massive amounts of military hardware in apartment buildings, homes, schools, community centers, and mosques.
While many Israelis are encouraged that the IDF is finally doing something to reclaim the North of Israel and make it safe for tens of thousands of Israelis to return home, it is not clear if Israel has a clear strategy or end game for this war, just as it has no end game for the war against Hamas in Gaza. It certainly does not want to get embroiled in a long-drawn-out ground war with Hezbollah that could make the 2006 Second Lebanon War look like child’s play. As the respected pollster and journalist Dahlia Scheindlin wrote: “If Israel occupies southern Lebanon, nobody at this point can claim they are unaware of what a curse that would bring [both Israel and Lebanon].” The Economist correspondent Gregg Carlstrom wrote succinctly: “History and common sense teach us that will be folly.”
We know that much of Israel’s fighting forces are exhausted and demoralized after almost a year of fighting in Gaza, the longest war in Israel’s history. With depleted reserves, the prospects for a serious two-front war are daunting and unsettling. We also know that, unlike its enemies, Israel is compelled to embrace the imperative to fight a just war justly. Doing so requires a great deal of restraint, planning, intelligence, and coordination with one’s allies and partners in the region and the world.
In the midst of all this fighting, Prime Minister Netanyahu is leaving the command center for a brief visit to the UN General Assembly. It’s sad and troubling that we don’t have a trusted leader – one who is earnest and is believed by his people and the world to put the country’s needs ahead of his own or to think strategically rather than politically. It’s sad and troubling that the current extremist Israeli governmental leadership imagines that the only possible solution to the current situation in the north is a military solution. Let us recognize that no matter how careful the preparation is, more Israeli soldiers and Lebanese civilians are going to die in this war. Perhaps, Israel should do everything diplomatically to move Hezbollah north of the Litani River (as stipulated by UN Res. 1701) to avoid more bloodshed. I’ve imagined that if there were a complete cessation of fighting, and a different Prime Minister announced that Israel is willing to consider a pathway to a resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, Saudi Arabia would join the Abraham Accords and a new Middle East united against Iran and its proxies could actually create a deterrent to war even with Hezbollah. I know that is unlikely at this junction, but we have to keep saying it.
I conclude this week with Israel’s many challenges left unresolved. But, stay tuned for next week when we resume our regularly scheduled program of reflection on the year since October 7, 2023.
Shabbat Shalom.