[lit-ideas] The UN Resolution on Lebanon
- From: Omar Kusturica <omarkusto@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: polidea@xxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Tue, 8 Aug 2006 15:14:02 -0700 (PDT)
http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?SectionID=107&ItemID=10723
The UN Resolution on Lebanon
An Israel-drafted cynical ploy
by Jonathan Cook
August 07, 2006
If there were any remaining illusions about the
purpose of Israel?s war against Lebanon, the draft
United Nations Security Council resolution calling for
a ?cessation of major hostilities? published at the
weekend should finally dispel them. This entirely
one-sided document was drafted, noted the
Hebrew-language media, with close Israeli involvement.
The top adviser to the Israeli Prime Minister, Ehud
Olmert, talked through the resolution with the US and
French teams, while the Israeli Foreign Ministry had
its man alongside John Bolton at the UN building in
New York.
The only thing preventing Israeli officials from
jumping up and down with glee, according Aluf Benn of
the daily Haaretz newspaper, was the fear that
?demonstrated Israeli enthusiasm for the draft could
influence support among Security Council members, who
could demand a change in wording that may adversely
affect Israel.? So no celebration parties till the
resolution is passed.
Instead, in a cynical ploy familiar from previous
negotiating processes, Israel submitted to the US a
list of requests for amendments to the resolution.
When Israel agrees to forgo these amendments, it will,
of course, be able to take credit for its flexibility
and desire to compromise; Lebanon and Hizbullah, on
the other hand, will be cast as villains, rejecting
international peace-making efforts.
The reason for Israel?s barely concealed pleasure is
that Hizbullah now faces an international diplomatic
and public relations assault in place of the
unsuccessful Israeli military one. Israel, and the
United States, are trying to set a series of traps for
Hizbullah -- and Lebanon too -- that will justify
Israel?s reoccupation of south Lebanon, the further
ethnic cleansing of the country, and a widening of the
war to include Iran, and possibly Syria.
The clues were not hard to decode. The US Secretary of
State, Condoleezza Rice, characterised the aim of the
resolution as clarifying who is acting in good faith.
?We're going to know who really did want to stop the
violence and who didn't,? she said. Or, in other
words, we are going to be able to blame Hizbullah for
the hostilities because we have offered them terms of
surrender we know they will never agree to.
The main sticking point for Hizbullah is to be found
in the resolution?s requirement that it must stop
fighting and begin a process of disarmament at a time
when Israeli forces are still occupying Lebanese
territory and when there may be a lengthy, if not
interminable, wait for their replacement by
international peacekeepers. Not only that, but the
resolution allows Israel to continue its military
operations for defensive purposes: Hizbullah only has
to look to Gaza or the West Bank to see what Israel is
likely to consider falling under the rubric of
?defensive?.
Hizbullah has been stockpiling weapons since Israel?s
withdrawal in May 2000 precisely to create a ?balance
of deterrence?, to make Israel more cautious about
sating its demonstrated appetite for occupying its
neighbours? lands, particularly when the neighbour is
a small country like Lebanon without a proper army and
divided into many sectarian groups, some of which, for
a price, may be willing to collaborate with Israel.
This time, however, as Israeli troops struggle back
towards the Litani River and their initial goal of
creating a ?buffer zone? similar to the one they held
on to for nearly two decades, the Lebanese are
rallying behind Hizbullah, convinced that the Shiite
militia is their only protection against Western
machinations for a ?new Middle East?.
Israel and Washington, however, may hope that, given
time, they can break that national solidarity by
provoking a civil war in Lebanon to deplete local
energies, similar to Israel?s attempts at engineering
feuds between Hamas and Fatah in the occupied
Palestinian territories. Certainly, it is difficult to
make sense otherwise of Israel?s bombing for the first
time of Christian neighbourhoods in Beirut and what
looks like the intended ethnic cleansing of Sunni
Muslims from Sidon, which was leafletted by Israeli
war planes at the weekend.
On the US-Israeli view, a nation of refugees living in
an open-air prison cut off from the outside world and
deprived of food and aid -- a more ambitious version
of the Gaza model -- may eventually be persuaded to
take their wrath out on their Shiite defenders.
Hizbullah understands that the proposal to bring in a
force of international peacekeepers is another trap.
Either the foreign troops will never arrive, because
on these Israeli-imposed terms there can be no
ceasefire, or, if they do arrive, they will quickly
become a proxy occupation army. Israel will have its
new South Lebanon Army, supplied direct this time from
the UN and subsidised by the West. If Hizbullah
fights, it will be killing foreign peacekeepers not
Israeli soldiers.
But Israel knows the international force is almost
certainly a non-starter, which seems to be the main
reason it has now, belatedly, become so enthusiastic
for it. Senior Israeli government officials were
saying as much in the Hebrew-language media on Sunday.
Israel?s Justice Minister, the increasingly hawkish
Haim Ramon, summed up the view from Tel Aviv: ?Even if
it is passed, it is doubtful that Hezbollah will honor
the resolution and halt its fire. Therefore we have to
continue fighting, continue hitting anyone we can hit
in Hezbollah, and I assume that as long as that goes
on, Israel's standing, diplomatically and militarily,
will improve.?
Israel hopes it will be able to keep hitting Hizbullah
harder -- at less cost to its troops and civilians,
and with improved diplomatic standing -- because in
the next phase, after the resolution is passed, the
Shiite militia will find that one arm has been tied,
figuratively speaking, behind its back.
Not only will Washington and Israel blame Hizbullah
for refusing to agree to the ceasefire but they will
seek to use any retaliation against Israeli
?defensive? aggression -- including, presumably,
further invasion -- as a pretext for widening the war
and dragging in the real target of their belligerence:
Iran.
This subterfuge was voiced at the weekend by Israel?s
ambassador to the UN, Dan Gillerman, who told the BBC
that if Hizbullah fired at Tel Aviv -- which it has
threatened to do if Israel continues attacking Beirut
-- this would be tantamount to an ?act of war? that
could only have been ordered by Iran. In other words,
at some point soon Israel may stop blaming Hizbullah
and turn its fire -- defensively, of course -- on
Iran.
This linkage is being carefully prepared by Olmert. On
Monday, according to the Hebrew-language press, he
told some 50 government spokespeople what message to
deliver to the foreign media: ?Our enemy is not
Hezbollah, but Iran, which employs Hezbollah as its
agent.? According to Haaretz, he urged the
spokespeople ?not to be ashamed to express emotion and
appeal to feelings?.
So in the coming days, in the wake of this US-Israeli
concoction of an impossible peace, we are going to be
hearing a lot more nonsense from Israel and the White
House about Iran?s role in supposedly initiating and
expanding this war, its desire to ?wipe Israel off the
map? and the nuclear weapons it is developing so that
it can achieve its aim.
The capture of two Israeli soldiers on 12 July will be
decoupled from Hizbullah?s domestic objectives. No one
will talk of those soldiers as bargaining chips in the
prisoner swap Hizbullah has been demanding; or as an
attempt by Hizbullah?s leader, Hassan Nasrallah, to
deflect US-inspired political pressure on him to
disarm his militia and leave Lebanon defenceless to
Israel?s long-planned invasion; or as a populist show
of solidarity by Hizbullah with the oppressed
Palestinians of Gaza.
Those real causes of hostilities will be ignored as
more, mostly Lebanese, civilians die, and Israel and
the US expand the theatre of war. Instead we will hear
much of the rockets that are still landing in northern
Israel and how they have been supplied by Iran. The
fact that Hizbullah attacks followed rather
precipitated Israel?s massive bombardment of Lebanon
will be forgotten. Rockets fired by Hizbullah to stop
Israeli aggression against Lebanon will be retold as
an Iranian-inspired war to destroy the Jewish state.
The nuclear-armed Goliath of Israel will, once again,
be transformed into a plucky little David. Or at least
such is the Israeli and US scenario.
Jonathan Cook is a writer and journalist based in
Nazareth, Israel. His book, ?Blood and Religion: The
Unmasking of the Jewish and Democratic State?, is
published by Pluto Press. His website is
www.jkcook.net
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