Israel's Water War

From Random Hipatia

The best chance for real peace to happen is in engagement. The best example of this can be found in the history of Israel itself, where a group of terrorist “animals”, responsible for horrible atrocities of their own, such as the bombing of the King David hotel, went on to become the government of Israel and two notorious terrorist leaders of their time to become their best known and most respected prime ministers.

Terrorism exists with wide public support when there are no other options offered in a society for justice. This was the case for Jewish terrorist organizations in Palestine resisting British occupation, and the case today for Palestinian Arabs.

Hezbollah’s own origins was in part in resistance to the brutal occupation of southern Lebanon by Israel and the militia terrorism of the phalangests, who were used by proxy by Israel. The bombing of the U.S. marine barracks was a particularly violent act, but at least, unlike when the terrorist leaders Ben Gurion and Menacham Began choose to bomb the King David hotel, it was a legitimate military target without a large civilian presence as well.

If history is any guide, the best way to achieve real peace in the middle east, at least along the Mediterranean coast is not through force of arms, but rather through engagement. Having Hezbollah as a governing faction in Lebanon with peaceful options to achieve useful goals and responsibilities was perhaps the best way to moderate and engage them in a manner that could lead to stable nations and hence a stable peace, just as having the PLO, and later, Hamas, would have done for the Palestinians. Today’s terrorist leaders can become tomorrow’s statesman.

The problem is not principally either with Hezbollah or Hamas, but with the modern government of Israel, which seems to have no interest in real peace, but only that which it can impose on others on it’s terms alone. The current roots of conflict are not at all ancient, as for many long periods Jews and Arabs have lived side by side, in fact for periods far longer and with less conflict, than Jews faced with Christians in Europe. Nor is the modern conflict still tied to the transplanting of a European (Jewish) population to the middle east in the late 40’s, an idea perhaps initially viewed by the locals as a “new crusade”.

I believe the current conflict instead goes back to the decisions made at the end of the 6 days war (in 1967), when the idea of “greater Israel” first took hold, the idea a pure Jewish nation stretching from the Mediterranean to the Jordon. Unfortunately, there was this large and rather inconvenient native Arab population in the middle of this new “greater Israel”. While no longer stated as loudly, the idea behind “greater Israel” still seems to represent the basic philosophy of the Israeli state to this day, now expressed as a form of apartheid state, with a “Palestinian Nationals” policy that very much resembles the discredited captive “homeland” policy of the old South Africa, and is the real source of current conflict.

Israel could occupy Damascus to Cairo, but there is no concept of permanently “defensible” borders. There will always be in time longer range rockets, and the larger population that is occupied, the greater the intensity of resistance movements. Peace can only be achieved either through mutual choice and respect, or the peace of the of liquidation, where people are removed in a kind of “final solution”, which brings us to the current Lebanon campaign.

Apparently the two captured Israeli soldiers have long since been forgotten, even by Israel. Israel claims a desire to have the Lebanese “national army” or some other force replace Hezbollah on it’s northern border. Yet, it choose to attack and kill Lebanese soldiers in their barracks far to the north as well as Hezbollah targets in the south, and to engage in widespread terror bombing of civilian infrastructure throughout the countryside. Hezbollah, for it’s part, maintained having the ability to fire missiles into Israel would be an effective deterrence to (then believed) future Israel incursions. Neither side, I suspect, understands the complete futility of attacks on civilian populations to “break the will” of their enemy.

I was always surprised, after enduring the London Blitz, and seeing first hand how this increased the resolve of the civilian population to support war, people like “Bomber” Harris could then, contrary to their own experience, think doing the same would somehow “break the resolve” of their enemy. Similarly, Hezbollah rocket attacks on Northern Israel has only increased support for the government, while the terror bombings of Israel has only served to further unify the people of southern Lebanon with Hezbollah. But out of this apparently failed set of policies, the goals of the current Israeli government, contrary to it’s stated claims, has become more clear.

First looking at the big picture it is clear that water security is the principle issue involved. Water security is even more vital for Israel than oil security is for the U.S. Why does Israel hang on so fiercely to the Golan heights to this day? Why in it’s future imposed map does it choose to divide the west bank into two captive Palestinian homelands (and keeping the Gaza strip as an isolated third one) while retaining settler blocks along the Jordon river valley? Both are tied to water security. Similarly, along with the Golan Heights, the hills of southern Lebanon are the primary current and best future potential aquifer sources for Northern Israel.

I think Israel’s principle war aim is to drive out the civilian population of southern Lebanon both by directly terrorizing the local population and by making habitation unsustainable. This is why they bomb villages whole, the occasional attacks on refugee convoys, the deliberate targeting of vital infrastructure, and why they demand the population to leave en-mass. It may also be possible that they selectively choose not to bomb certain places where refugees can then congregate, until later, such as seems to have happened with Sidon. This policy was demonstrated, by the U.S. military at the end of WW II, to drive Japanese refugees into select cities where they would feel momentarily safe, and then to attack those places to keep the population further terrorized.

If depopulating Southern Lebanon is the Israeli goal, this may also better explain why they bombed the Lebanese regular army as well. They do understand that in doing this they are at war with Lebanon, and the people of Lebanon, as a whole, and not just Hezbollah. The key question is not what will happen the next month, as they engage in incursions in the south, but rather if the displaced populations will ever really be allowed to return, even if some kind of “cease fire” is declared afterward, and Condi then returns to the U.S. proclaiming “mission accomplished” by proxy for Bush…

In the years immediately following the 6 day war, people like Sharon openly advocated driving the Palestine Arab population across the Jordon river to achieve their vision of “greater Israel”. This idea never found the right political conditions where they could actually do this in the West Bank. The conditions today, in Lebanon, however, do offer the possibility to do this in Southern Lebanon under the guise of “protecting” their borders. They do not need to “resettle” Southern Lebanon, but they certainly could want a permanently depopulated area, and the greater access to scare water resources that would achieve.

No lasting peace can be achieved by Israel through force of arms. But a lasting (and just) peace does not appear to be their goal. Many suggest Hezbollah is playing “Iran’s” game by proxy, and this is probably true. But I suspect both now find themselves playing Israel’s game in Lebanon.