Patrick Seale:
Terrorism is usually defined as the indiscriminate killing of civilians in pursuit of political goals. Is this not what Israel is doing in both Lebanon and Gaza? It is killing large numbers of Lebanese and Palestinian civilians in pursuit of its political aim of annihilating Hizballah and Hamas. By any objective standard, Israel is guilty of state terrorism.
But killing Arabs in this wanton manner and smashing their countries must inevitably have negative consequences for Israel’s own security. Israel’s terrorist behaviour legitimizes the terrorism of its enemies. And America’s uncritical support for Israel legitimises terrorism against the United States itself. That is what 9/11 was all about, although to this day the United States has not faced up to why it was attacked. The United States and Israel are sowing the wind and will reap the whirlwind.
Washington’s unconditional backing for Israel highlights the fact that this is not simply a war between Israel and Hizballah. By seeking to bomb Lebanon into submission, Israel intends to strike a blow at the Iran-Syria-Hizballah axis, which has challenged US-Israeli dominance in the region. The key issue is whose will is to prevail in this vital part of the world.
If the conflict had been a purely local one, Israel might have agreed to an exchange of prisoners, as both Hizballah and Hamas demanded, and as has taken place a number of times in the past. Some 10,000 Palestinian prisoners still languish in Israeli jails. To secure their release is a major Palestinian objective.
But the war has a wider dimension. The United States has given Israel a free rein because it is confronted with the probability of two highly disagreeable developments: a nuclear-armed Iran and a humiliating defeat in Iraq. It urgently needs to regain the initiative in the wider Middle East and has persuaded itself – or been persuaded by Israel’s friends inside and outside the Administration -- that Israel can help it do so. The pro-Israeli neocons in the United States have been trumpeting that a victory for Israel in Lebanon will be a victory for the United States, and a defeat for Israel will be a defeat for the United States.
This is the essential background to Israel’s war, which had clearly been long planned in concert with the United States, and with the encouragement of some Christian Lebanese extremists, not unhappy to see Israel do the dirty work for them in breaking Hizballah.
Nothing extraordinary in this analysis, but it does lay things out in a succinct manner.
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