War - Who can stop it now?
Cover story
Zaki Chehab
Monday 24th July 2006
Bush and Blair give the green light for more Israeli strikes. Syria and Iran back Hezbollah. As the Middle East explodes, Zaki Chehab, an authority on Hamas, reveals where the real power in the region lies - and the only chance for lasting peace
More from this section [Cover story]
Amon Regular - In Israel, hints of a deal - but when? [free to view]
James Buchan - Oil: We're addicted [free to view]
Brian Cathcart - When will the oil run out? [free to view]
More by Zaki Chehab
Al-Qaeda: still a step ahead (03/07/2006)
They ask, we ask: was it worse under Saddam? (20/03/2006)
Browse all articles by Zaki Chehab in the NS Library
Never before have Israeli soldiers and officers faced such humiliation: not since the creation of the state of Israel in 1948. It began on the morning of 25 June 2006 when 19-year-old Corporal Gilad Shalit was abducted by Palestinians from three different militant groups, including the military wing of Hamas, Izzedine al-Qassam.
Next, Hezbollah fighters slipped into Israel from southern Lebanon for "Operation True Promise". On Wednesday 12 July, they waited for an Israeli patrol to pass by, kidnapped two soldiers, and killed at least seven more. Hezbollah then shelled the area north of the Shtula settlement, near the border, preventing the Israeli soldiers from retrieving the bodies of their fellows or helping the injured. For almost seven hours Israeli troops held back, worried that "surprises" might await if they got closer.
What prompted the operation to abduct the soldiers was a promise made by the general secretary of Hezbollah, Hasan Nasrallah, to the family of Samir al-Qantar, a Lebanese prisoner who has been in an Israeli jail, with no family visits, since 1979. Now aged 43, Qantar was sentenced to 542 years in jail in 1980 for the deaths of three Israelis. Israel refused to release him in a prisoner exchange that took place in 2004. Nasrallah gave his word that the next time Hezbollah celebrated the withdrawal of Israeli forces from southern Lebanon, Qantar would be there to celebrate. Six months ago, he ordered his com manders to keep their eyes open for an opportunity to abduct Israeli soldiers.
For more than a year, a flood of advanced weapons has flowed from Tehran to Hezbollah's military bases in Leba non, including unmanned drones taking reconnaissance photographs. It is the first time in the Arab-Israeli conflict that an Arab country has used this stealth technology.
In a chilling message, broadcast on 14 July to the citizens of Israel, Nasrallah warned: "From now on, you wanted open warfare, so it will be open warfare. Those times when Israel used to get away with whatever destruction, killing of children and freedom of movement on Arab lands have come to an end. I promise you those times have passed, therefore you must also bear the responsibility for what your government has done and has undertaken." In an equally menacing speech, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the Iranian president, warned Israel not to widen the conflict and declared "the Islamic Republic of Iran's support for the people and government of Syria in the event of any probable attack". On Sunday, the Iranian foreign ministry said Israel would face "unimaginable losses" if it chose to attack Syria. Iranian support for Syria was conducted through phone calls made by the Iranian president to his Syrian counterpart, Bashar al-Assad, or through messages delivered by the Iranian
foreign minister when he visited Damascus over the weekend.
Hezbollah's access to Iran's military arsenal has long given cause for debate. Now, following its success in destroying one of Israel's top naval ships, and the discovery, according to Israeli military experts, that its long-range missiles are capable of hitting Tel Aviv, it has become clear that some dangerous changes have been made to the rules of the game of Middle Eastern politics.
Although the theatres of war are Lebanon, Israel and Gaza, the cast list includes Iran and, to a lesser extent, Syria.
News of the Hezbollah kidnapping reached the Israeli prime minister, Ehud Olmert, as he was receiving the family of Gilad Shalit, the soldier abducted by Hamas earlier. Olmert was forced to tell Gilad's parents that he could not bow to the terrorists' demands. But, despite this tough talk by the Israeli prime minister, those who know the Gaza Strip, and the developments which took place there following Israel's unilateral decision to withdraw, know that the Israeli army would not reoccupy Gaza. The price would be too great for a prime minister who has been in power less than four months and lacks the military credentials of his predecessors. And there are precedents: there have been many occasions when Israel has exchanged prisoners, the most recent being in 2004, when it released more than 400 prisoners in return for an Israeli businessman and the bodies of two Israeli soldiers held by Hezbollah.
During the early days of the intifada, Israeli patrols could travel confidently around the Gaza Strip and the West Bank with just a couple of jeeps, a group of 12 soldiers and perhaps a Merkava tank or two to keep the areas under control. At the very least they would be confronted with stone missiles. The worst-case scenario was to come under fire from home-made petrol bombs.
Nowadays, however, Hamas's military wing is producing sophisticated weapons. Even its basic hand grenades are designed to standards as advanced and effective as any attained in the US or China. All its products are stamped with "Made in Gaza by al-Qassam". The original missiles, known as al-Qassam 1 and al-Qassam 2, inflicted limited damage but Qassam senior leaders told me, when I was in Gaza for the Palestinian elections, that it is only a matter of time before they become capable of manufacturing weapons that will "give Israel a taste of its own medicine".
There is a lesson that Israel needs to learn from its failure to prevent Hezbollah's missiles from raining down on its cities, even though its military has recourse to US-made Patriot missiles which, in theory, should divert or stop them. The message is that the only way forward is a long-term solution that will bring justice to the Palestinians and peace to Leba-non and Israel. And this can be achieved only by "an honest broker": that is to say, one who can and will enforce a just peace plan on both Israel and the Palestinians. Israel must not be given preferential treatment. Forcing the weak party (the Palestinians or the Lebanese) to accept deals will ensure that those deals do not last.
The key to resolving the crisis in the region is not, as the US president, George W Bush, suggests, simply to release the captured soldiers. Nor does the answer lie in plans such as those outlined by the British Prime Minister, Tony Blair, for the deployment of a European or international force on the border between Lebanon and Israel.
This would provide only a partial solution. Behind the current crisis is the long-term crisis: the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. Only a revival of the peace process, marked by a genuine commitment from Israel (which must be guaranteed by the United States, the United Nations and Europe and based on the "road map"), will give the Palestinians a ray of hope that the end of the occupation is in sight.
Israel will ignore any solution to reach a ceasefire that will not return its soldiers and force Hezbollah to leave its bases in southern Lebanon. Israel has secured full American support for its plans, by reminding the US of its commitment to fighting the "axis of evil", which embraces Iran and Syria, both backers of Hezbollah, as the parties that are trying to force their own agenda on the Middle East political scene.
Hamas and Hezbollah present the face of Iran's front line in the Arab-Israeli conflict. Tehran's financial and moral support for both movements is part of the alliance Iran is trying to build in the Middle East to block US ambitions in Iraq and the wider region. An Iranian former ambassador to Damascus, the hardliner Ali Akbar Mohtashemi, was behind the launch of Hezbollah in 1982. It had been conceived by a group of clerics after the Israeli invasion of Lebanon that year.
Since then the party has been attached to the Iranian revolution and its religious and political ideology. Mohtashemi is now secretary general of a Tehran-based committee that supports the Palestinian intifada. Hezbollah (meaning "the Party of God") is a Shia party, unlike Palestine's Hamas, or Islamic Jihad, both of which are Sunni movements. It enjoys huge support among Lebanon's large Shia community, for which Hezbollah provides many social and welfare services such as schools and clinics, as well as rebuilding houses and roads destroyed by Israel during the occupation of Lebanon.
Several of its members are represented in the Lebanese parliament. Despite their devotion to the Islamic way of life, Hezbollah members have always emphasised to Lebanon's other religious groups - the Christian Maronites, the Druze and the Sunnis - that they have no intention of making the country an Islamic state. What unites Hezbollah and Hamas is their objection to all peace agreements with Israel.
The Palestinian prime minister, Ismail Haniyeh, a leading figure in Hamas, recently announ ced his organisation's willingness, at long last, to recognise Israel's right to exist, and he has agreed to sign a document, drawn up by Palestinian prisoners from all factions, declaring that they accept the existence of the state of Israel. This recognition of Israel by Hamas is exactly what the international community demanded following the movement's success in January's Palestinian elections. But its olive branch appears to be blowing in the wind. The latest Israeli military incursion could undermine the historically important shift in the position of Hamas, and the entire fate of the peace process.
Certainly, there are moral and logistical connections between Iran, Syria, Hezbollah and Hamas. If Israel continues and extends its attacks on Lebanon, this will only strengthen their bonds. They will also attract the support of many Muslims and Arabs who, though not potentially on the side of militant Islam, have many grievances with Israel and the United States.
Zaki Chehab's book "Inside Hamas: the untold story", will be published by I B Tauris later this year
Timeline of a catastrophe
12 July Hezbollah fighters in Lebanon capture two Israeli soldiers in a cross-border raid. In response, Israel bombs southern Lebanon and troops cross the border for the first time since 2000.
13 July Israeli bombs runways at Beirut's international airport and imposes an air and sea blockade on Lebanon. Thirty-five people are killed, and a Hezbollah rocket hits the Israeli town of Haifa.
14 July Israeli bombing continues and the number of Lebanese civilians killed tops 50. The Iranian president warns of a "fierce response" should Israel attack Syria.
15 July Air raids spread further into Lebanon and the country is declared a "disaster zone". Hezbollah fires rockets into Tiberias, 35 kilometres south of the border.
16 July A rocket kills eight Israelis in Haifa, and 23 people are killed by bombing in southern Lebanon. G8 leaders blame "extremist forces" .
17 July Air strikes continue in northern and eastern Lebanon. The Lebanese death toll reaches 176, including 163 civilians.
18 July Israeli attacks continue. Hundreds of foreign nationals are evacuated from Beirut. The UN warns of a "humanitarian disaster".
19 July Death toll so far: 270 Lebanese and 25 Israelis, mostly civilians on both sides.
Rachel Aspden
This article first appeared in the New Statesman.
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More from this section [Cover story] . . .
Amon Regular - In Israel, hints of a deal - but when? [free to view]
James Buchan - Oil: We're addicted [free to view]
Brian Cathcart - When will the oil run out? [free to view]
Andrew Stephen - The house of slaves
More by Zaki Chehab . . .
Al-Qaeda: still a step ahead (03/07/2006)
They ask, we ask: was it worse under Saddam? (20/03/2006)
Browse all articles by Zaki Chehab in the NS Library
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