"This may sound cliched, but with Israel fighting a fierce organization like Hezbollah--an extremely well organized, well-trained and well-financed and supplied (by Syria and Iran) terrorist fighting force, Israel, one of the great military powers in the world and I might add, one of the great high-tech and economic powers in the world today, finds itself facing an enemy who thrives among civilians, lives and shoots among civilians--and whose sole targets are civilians (Israelis)."

I hate to defend Hezbollah but the latter part of this statement is absurdly false. Hezbollah isn’t solely targeting civilians; many of its targets are Israeli soldiers many of whom are now on Lebanese soil. While it has commited some terrorist acts, Hezbollah is primarily a guerrilla army.

I think the statement illustrates the double standards in much of the US media about Israeli and Arab violence. Even when Israel kills hundreds of civilians there is a distinct effort to make excuses usually with the magic mantra of “collateral damage”. When it comes to Arabs, even attacks on Israeli soldiers are strongly condemned.

Posted at August 8, 2006 11:11 PM in response to The War (Israel-Lebanon) from Here (Brooklyn)

The idea that a war between Hezbollah and Israel was inevitable is fanciful to say the least. In military terms Hezbollah is a guerilla group and doesn't possess the capacity to successfully initiate a large attack against the Israeli military. What it's good at doing is surviving and frustrating an Israeli attack. If Israel hadn't attacked, it's extremely unlikely that Hezbollah would have launched a major attack on Israel.

Nor is true that the mere accumulation of a rocket arsenal is an indication of Hezbollah plans to initiate a large-scale attack. There are several reasons for Hezbollah to build its arsenal : to deter an Israeli invasion, to build its own prestige, to create a bargaining chip etc. Not to mention the fact that Hezbollah exists in a divided and unstable country with a history of civil war.

Posted at July 30, 2006 8:58 AM in response to How Bad Was It?

Thanks for those statistics: exactly the kind I have been looking for. As I suspected Hezbollah has been a minor threat in terms of actual casualties inficted on Israel. And I think you are exactly right that limited tit-for-tat retaliations on Hezbollah were the right policy both morally and pramatically.

Someone correct me if I am wrong but these numbers about Hezbollah-inflicted casualties in recent years have largely(totally?) gone unreported in the US media, right? One would think that amidst all the hysteria about the dire threat posed by Hezbollah, the MSM would have bothered to dig up and report the basic facts. Isn't that what the MSM is supposed to do better than blogs?

Posted at July 29, 2006 11:22 AM in response to How Bad Was It?

Has anyone compiled a list of the "new dawns" in Iraq since the invasion began? There was the Saddam statue moment, the transfer of "sovereignty", Saddam's capture, the election, the new constitution and quite a few others.

Each time there were cries of vindication by war supporters as well as much crowing at how this or that shining moment utterly discredited opponents of the war. All this is great material for exposing just how foolish and naive pro-war commentators have been over the last few years and the blogosphere needs to make better use of it.

Posted at July 27, 2006 12:02 AM in response to No New Thing Under The Sun

An obvious reason for the initial restraint on the part of Egypt, S Arabia etc. may be that they were worried that the crisis would distract from the diplomatic efforts against Iran's nuclear activities which is exactly what appears to have happened. The US has actually been quite skillfull in isolating Iran in the last year or so but much of that effort may be down the tube after this crisis.

It's hard to exaggerate the strategic and moral bankruptcy of the US government (both the administration and Congress) in responding to this crisis. The knee-jerk defense of Israel even as the Lebanese people were being pulverised was bad enough but in general the US has appeared pathetic and irrelevant which will sharply reduce whatever authority it still has left in the region.

Posted at July 25, 2006 11:45 PM in response to Tilting Back

Well that raises the question: what is the best way of helping poor people generally? Many poor people especially in rich countries are prone to self-destructive behavior: drug addiction, teen pregnancy etc. Ignoring the judgemental aspect there is still the practical issue of how to help people trapped in such situations. There are probably some low-hanging fruit in terms of poor people who have good work habits but have suffered from bad luck but it's far from clear that the majority of the poor fall in this category: particularly when we are talking about the hard-core poor.

Personally I believe that even the "undeserving poor": ie those who have repeately made poor choices should be helped by government but I don't think you can use the same approach as with the "deserving poor". Something tougher might be needed though I am not sure what the precise policies should be.

Posted at July 25, 2006 11:20 AM in response to Clear Enough

Speaking of Hezbollah-inflicted fatalities, does any one have any statistics on the number of Israelis killed by Hezbollah in ,say, the last five years along with a military/civilian breakdown?

It wouldn't surprise me if Israel has killed more Lebanese civilians in the last few days than Hezbollah has killed Israelis in the last few years.

Posted at July 18, 2006 1:05 PM in response to Dangerous Cleverness

I think that the key is East Jerusalem. Unless Israel is ready to give it up (with some kind of sovreignty over Jewish holy places) there is no prospect of a lasting peace. Unfortunately I don't think either the Israeli public or the government at large is prepared as of now to give up on the idea of Jerusalem as the undivided capital of Israel. Until there is a change of public opinion I don't think that any lasting peace is possible.

Of course there are other issues like the right of return but there have been some signals that the Palestinians are prepared to compromise on this though they obviously won't give it up as a bargaining chip before actual negotiations. There is also the question of whether the Palestinians have the capacity to make a peace stick though this is probably doable given sufficient attention and resources from key outside parties like the US and Egypt.

Posted at July 16, 2006 9:02 AM in response to "Real" Problems

The British counter-insurgency in Malaysia after WW2 is often cited as an example of a success on the part of a liberal democracy. I don't know much about it but it might be an interesting project for Matt or some other opinion journalist.

Let me just add that I think that Fred Kaplan is terrific and perhaps the best national security commentator writing today. He works hard and reads the original reports and also has the knack of finding fresh things to say on much-discussed issues. It's a shame he works in relative obscurity while mediocre commentators like Tom Friedman get the attention.

Posted at July 10, 2006 9:50 AM in response to Counterinsurgency for Fun and Profit

Thanks for bringing this up. It bothers me that so much commentary about Iran seems to systematically exaggerate the scope of various anti-Israel comments made by Iranian leaders like Rafsanjani and Ahmadinejad. I don't know whether it's lazines or deliberate deception or some combination of the two.

The same thing has been done with Ahmadinejad's "wiped off the map" remark which ,in the context of the speech, was clearly a reiteration of Iran's one-state policy and not a threat of the physical destruction of Israel. Here is the speech for those who haven't read it.

The bottom line is that the current Iranian regime is nasty and hostile in many respects and it would be a good idea to prevent it from acquiring nuclear weapons. However it is extremely unlikely to initiate a nuclear attack against Israel or anyone else and commentators need to stop pulling quotes out of context to suggest otherwise.

Posted at April 15, 2006 9:50 PM in response to Once More With Feeling