    http://peacepalestine.blogspot.com/

    Gilad Atzmon - Pour out your fury upon the people of Lebanon and Gaza

    Two weeks ago it was Palestinian militants who abducted a legitimate
    military target, an Israeli soldier. Yesterday it was a similar
    overwhelmingly orchestrated heroic attack by Hezbollah guerrilla
    fighters. Both attacks are there to send a message of resistance: Israel
    will never succeed in imposing its sickening unilateral notion of
    ‘peace’. Indeed, the unilateral disengagement may have had a magical
    effect on the Israeli voters as well as some Zionised western leaders
    such as Bush, Blair and Merkel. Yet, the inhabitants of Gaza and the
    villagers of Southern Lebanon are slightly less impressed with the
    Israeli inclination t owards peace. In Gaza and in Southern Lebanon it
    is rather clear that Arab resistance forces will oppose the Israeli
    unilateral agenda ‘til the end of time. They all know that as much as it
    takes two to tango, peace will never prevail unless the Palestinian
    cause is properly addressed. In short, the different forms of Israeli
    unilateral disengagements from Lebanon, Gaza or even the West Bank (to
    come) are not going to provide Israel with peace. Quite the opposite;
    Arabs are no fools, they know very well that Israel escaped Lebanon
    after being militarily humiliated for two decades. They know as well
    that Sharon ran away from Gaza not exactly because he was searching for
    peace. Palestinians also know that it is just a question of time before
    that happens in the West Bank. If to be precise, since 1973 Israel’s
    power of deterrence is shrinking. Since 1973 Israel hasn’t managed to
    defeat any of its enemies. On the contrary, time after time it is the
    enemies of Israel who are able to dictate Israeli political and tactical
    manoeuvres. In the last two weeks it has been two relatively small
    paramilitary organisations who use guerrilla techniques who managed to
    bring Israel to unleash its full military might against innocent
    civilians both in Gaza and Lebanon.

    Yet, the Israeli reaction to attacks by Palestinian militants and
    Hezbollah is rather bizarre. Although, both Palestinian militants and
    Hezbollah were originally targeting legitimate military targets, Israeli
    retaliation was clearly aiming against civilian targets, civil
    infrastructures and mass killing directed against an innocent
    population. It doesn’t take a genius to realise that this is not really
    the way to win a war or confront that particular sort of combat known as
    guerrilla warfare.

    I would argue that once again the Israeli government serves us with a
    fascinating glimpse into the mindset of the Israeli collective psyche. I
    will try to elaborate on this issue.

    Due to some clear historical circumstances, the Israeli army was
    originally formed to combat Arab armies. It was designed to win
    conventional war in the battlefield. It was set up as well to exhaust
    Israel’s neighbours’ will to fight while exercising some overwhelming
    air superiority and nuclear threatening policies. Since the end of the
    cold war, things changed. Israel isn’t threatened anymore by its
    neighbouring states. Moreover, in the most recent years it has become
    clear that it is actually the Palestinian people who will eventually
    shatter the dream of a Jewish national state.

    Strangely enough, Israel has never adopted or revised its military
    doctrine to fit into the new emerging conditions. Indeed it retrained
    large parts of its fighting units as policing forces, it transformed
    some of its tanks into policing vehicles. Yet, it has never gone through
    a vast military doctrine shift. Very much like the Wehrmacht at the time
    of WWII, the IDF is still a classic follower of the offensive military
    doctrine. Hitherto, rather than winning in the battlefield, the IDF is
    now hopelessly exhausting itself in two fronts fighting relatively small
    paramilitary organisations. But the situation can get worse, it is
    rather possible that Palestinian heroic enthusiasm will spread to the
    West Bank. When this happens, the IDF will find itself engaged in a
    total war just a few kilometres from Israel’s most densely populated
    centres. Seemingly the so-called ‘strongest army in the Middle East’ is
    fighting a desperate war it can never win, neither tactically nor
    morally.

    Tactically, we have en ough historic references to conclude that no
    colonial army has ever won against guerrilla warfare. The reason is
    simple, the more destruction a colonial army spreads, the more popular
    the guerrilla fighters become amongst their surrounding supportive
    population. This is absolutely the case in Gaza and in Beirut today. The
    more carnage there is in Gaza, the stronger the Hamas becomes. The more
    bombs dropped over Beirut’s Airport, the more will young men be willing
    to join the Hezbollah.

    But it goes further, both the Palestinian militants and the Hezbollah
    were very clever in picking pure military targets. While in the past,
    the Palestinian paramilitary groups were typically associated with
    suicidal attacks against Israeli civilians, this time it was Israeli
    soldiers and pure military posts that were targeted. In other words, it
    is rather impossible to dismiss the fact that Palestinian militants an d
    the Hezbollah were actually operating as legitimate resistance
    paramilitary groups fighting a colonial army and occupation forces.

    However, reading the news from the Middle East, it is rather obvious
    that the Israeli government has no clear agenda to counter the current
    daring military operations against its army and if this isn’t enough,
    the IDF has no means to counter such guerrilla assaults. Today’s
    merciless collateral damage in Beirut as well as in Gaza proves that at
    least militarily, Israel is in total despair. It has neither the
    political nor the military answer to counter Arab resistance. But here
    comes the catch; Israel doesn’t need an answer as such, it doesn’t even
    look for one.

    Israel is a racially orientated democracy. Its leaders are engaged in
    one thing only, i.e. maintenance of the their political power. As far
    as the Israeli political game is concerned, the rule is very simple, the
    more Arab blood you have on your hands the more you are suited to get on
    with your governing job. This rule obviously was in favour of Rabin,
    Sharon, Barak and Netanyahu. Olmert and Peretz are still quite far
    behind. Both the prime minister and his defence minister lack some real
    experience in military and security matters. Hence they have a lot of
    catching up to do.

    In other words, Peretz and Olmert have to provide the Israeli people
    with a glorious spectacle of merciless retaliation. They have to prove
    to their keen voters that they have internalised the real biblical
    meaning of ‘an eye for an eye’. Looking at the carnage in Beirut today
    it somehow seems as if they even try to give the old Hebraic say a new
    meaning. As devastating as it may sound, this is exactly what the
    Israelis want them to do. Within democratic Israel the biblical call
    "pour out your fury upon the goyim” is translated into a Jewish secular
    pragmatic political practice. This isn’t sad. This is a real tragedy.
    And I wonder whether there is anyone out there who is still overwhelmed
    with the Israeli unilateral peace agenda?