We Will Not Accept Absurdities as an Excuse for Carnage

by Imad-ad-Dean Ahmad, Ph.D., Minaret of Freedom Institute, www.minaret.org

Americans are being sold a bill of goods to generate support for the Israeli carnage in Lebanon by the use two “big lies.” One is the pretense that “it all started with Hizbullah’s capture of two Israeli soldiers,” ignoring that Hizbullah was seeking the release of at least some of the over 9000 mainly political prisoners (many of whom are women and children) captured (or should I say, Israeli propaganda-style, “kidnapped”) by Israel. Even if it had been the case that Hizbollah’s action had been provocative, the Israeli response was certainly disproportionate. It is worse than disproportionate for it is retaliation for what was an act of war by an act of “collective punishment.” The deliberate destruction of the Lebanese infrastructure and the disgraceful technique of slaughtering a massive population as a means of striking back at what, by Israeli accounts, is a relatively small number of militants, would seem to qualify as terrorism.

Which brings us to the second “big lie” that the explanation for Israel’s collateral damage rate (about 90%) is so much higher than Hizbullah’s (about 35%) is not due to a policy of collective punishment, but simply that the Israelis are frustrated by the fact that Hizbullah hides behind “human shields.” Almost no one outside the United States falls for that one, but now even Americans have no excuse to fall for it as the Israeli propaganda machine itself has published the truth, having “dropped leaflets warning residents of the Lebanese capital that more extensive bombing, whose ‘painful and severe results will not be limited’ to Hezbollah fighters, is on the way” (“Israel Hits Tower In Beirut, Warns Of More Bombing,”—Washington Post). Hizbullah, being a resistance movement, is unavoidably integrated into the local population. Israel, being a state, chooses where to place its military weaponry on strategic grounds and it has chosen to place them where even an opponent that has its match in “smart bombs” and American intelligence sources would be challenged to minimize civilian casualties. That Hizbullah has killed so many more military personnel than civilians is truly remarkable and suggests that their objective is to damage the military machine that is destroying their homeland, whereas Israel’s objective is to punish the people of Lebanon for not doing their bidding by turning on Hizbullah.

Sheikh Abbas Zako, an Israeli Arab member of the Knesset, has charged that Israel has been deliberately positioning tanks next to the homes of Arab Israelis (“Army Uses Israeli Arabs as Shield: MK”—Islamonline). The substantial number of Arabs killed by the Hizbullah rockets supports his allegations, since if Hizbullah were deliberately targeting civilians they would be expected to target non-Arabs. It is significant that civilian Christians under attack on both sides blame Israel and not Hizbullah for their problems.

These two big lies are supported by a seemingly endless set of little lies, distortions, half-truths and omissions. Consider, for example, the allegations that Hizbullah is using certain anti-personnel weapons that spew shrapnel. Israel used such weapons supplied by the United States in the 1980 invasion of Lebanon, in violation of the laws under which the weapons were provided to them. Invincible to American law, however, Israel has the chutzpah to seek replenishments of such weapons even now, suggesting that they are in use or will be used in its current campaign.

Let us conclude by revisiting the first and keystone of the lies, that this is all because Hizbullah captured two soldiers and won’t release them. Clearly Israel can obtain their release any time it chooses by simply doing what it has done so many times before and exchange prisoners. The argument put forward against this is that to do so would reward Hizbullah for capturing the prisoners and instead Hizbullah should unconditionally release the two soldiers. Of all the despicable prevarication this is the most transparent. From this premise it would logically follow that releasing the prisoners is that last thing Hizbullah should do, for by doing so it would reward Israel for its inhumane (I’ll restrain myself from saying genocidal) attacks on the people on Lebanon, even as it gives a pass to the Israeli “hostage-taking.”


Posted

in

by

Tags:

Comments

One response to “We Will Not Accept Absurdities as an Excuse for Carnage”

  1. Dain Avatar

    Good words. Also, Robert Pape has some more info on the true nature of Lebanese resistance, from the 80s until now: http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/08/03/opinion/edpape.php

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

RSS
Follow by Email