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?