A Very Occasional Reader asks if I’m interested in issues around Hezbollah. To which, of course, the answer is “Yes”. I can point to posts I’ve done with various commentators on the Northern Threat to Israel, and the recent attacks and counter attacks. (eg here and here, and here)
This article below by Ron Ben Ishai, sent along by the VOR, is kind of interesting, talking about the preemptive Israeli strike, which gives good props to the IDF and Mossad. With Ben Ishai seeming to side with Yonah Jeremy Bob, who I posted recently saying that Iran and Lebanon and Hezbollah were not keen to start a war with Israel this year at least. For various reasons that are set out in that post.
I think the following are the most problematic parts of Ben Ishai’s analysis. That the US is somehow a good actor in all this. That somehow it’s possible to “end the war” in Gaza by "reaching a deal" with Hamas to release the hostages. What planet are they living on, these commenters? That’s all the US and Israel have been trying to do, that’s all that’s been offered to Hamas since Day 1, and all that Hamas has done is to deny, reject, refuse and to demand ever more concessions, that would effectively make them the victors in this war. Thus demanding that this be the only war in history that the vanquished have sued for peace by making demands on the victors.
This is the ongoing delusion in the American and the Israeli Left. That somehow there are some good actors amongst the “Palestinians”, the Hamas, the PA, the Fatah. There are not. Which the latter have made abundantly and repeatedly clear.
About time that we in the west understood this. And that leftist Israelis, who live in Israel, who think they know more about how peace ought be achieved, understand this.
/Snip:
At the end of the day, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, in consultation with Defense Minister Yoav Gallant and Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi and his General Staff officers, chose the most solid alternative proposed by the IAF - A “preemptive strike to remove the threat” that would disrupt Hezbollah’s preparations for a revenge strike, followed immediately by a defensive campaign to thwart Hezbollah’s intentions of creating a security situation with its remaining rocket launchers and UAVs in South Lebanon.Several weighty considerations came into play before deciding on this restrained course of action. The most important was the demand by US and its allies that Israel not act in such a way that would tailspin into a regional war. Now, in the throngs of US elections and the war in Gaza, the Democratic administration’s striving to avoid a regional war has intensified to obsessive levels.It’s not hard to understand why: If the US comes good on its commitment of taking part in defending Israel from Iran and its proxies, American soldiers will likely be coming back in coffins, and the price of gas and cooking fuel would increase - every American presidential candidate’s nightmare.So, Washington made a proposal that was hard to refuse: Israel was required to avoid actions that the Americans believe could embroil both them and us in a regional war: Cooperate in efforts to reach a deal to release the hostages that would end the war in Gaza and; allow unlimited humanitarian aid into the Gaza Strip.
"U.S. proposal and Hezbollah's revenge” | Ron Ben Yishai
