lebonon not happy with U.N. resolution.Follow

Nothing else you wrote matters. I don't really care what your, my neighbour's, or his dog's concept of International law is. You can yap on about "soveriegnty" all you like, this is not the Wild West, nor the 18th Century.

What should/could have Israel done?

Make a formal complaint to the Security Council. Negotiate with Hezbollah. They could've bombed certain straegic locations if they were 100% sure they were Hezbollah arms cache.

But that's the thing. Israel did not look for a diplomatic solution. They did not attempt to negotiate with Hezbollah.

That's not me talking, it's the rules of International Law.

Now, you're more than welcome to ***** about those rules, and say they suck, and that they will lead to more bloodshed. You are completetly entitled to do that.

What I can't stand is you pretending you know something you baltantly don't know anything about, and then say it's "the law". It's not. It's what you would want the law to be.

You refer to Pearl Harbour. That was before the UN and modern international law. So it's not extremely relevant.

It's funny but you seem to think there are only two courses of actions in the world. Doing nothing, or killing everyone. It's a cute idea, but it's a tiny bit more complex than that.

I don't like Hezbollah. I don't like groups that use violence to further their cause.

But today, Hezbollah has some legitimacy as a resistance movment. Israel still occupy parts of Lebanon that it shouldn't. As stated by UNSC 242 and 338. Are Hezbollah entitled to take this matter into their own hands? Surely if ISrael is allowed to implement the resolution about Hezbollah dismantling, then anyone is allowed to take the necessary steps to make sure Israel withdraws from the Cheeb farms. See where this is going? When people start to unilaterally decide what Resolution they will themselves "implement", then wars will break out everywhere.

Second, you probably know this, Israel do incursions on Lebanese territory to capture "Hezbollah militants" all the time. They also practice "state assassination", where they bomb a house in Lebanon from a helicopter in order to kill someone they dont like. Is lebanon justified in invading ISrael because of this? And, even funnier, they do the same in Syria. Would you support a Syrian invasion of Israel in the same way? I doubt it.

Edited, Aug 16th 2006 at 5:31am EDT by RedPhoenixxxxxx

Of course not.

In this context, however, Lebanon does not want to destroy Israel. So, this is a moot point in regards to this thread.

Look, Israel existence is secured, whatever some populist nutjob might say to please his poorly educated followers.

Who seriously threatens Israel's existence? Lebanon? Egypt? Syria? Jordan? The only one I can think of is Iran. And even they will never attack Israel, since they know the consequences will be devastating. Even their "president" is not crazy enough to attempt that.

Don't get me wrong. The second Israel's existence is threatened, then by all means relpy.

However, I don't think you can seriously call Hezbollah's actions a "threat to Israel's existence".

Neat trick for an organization that was formed in the 80s...

Math > Smash.



Bolded bit is intentional. They won a "diplomatic" victory because people like you have made it impossible for Israel (or anyone actually fighting against groups like Hezbollah) to ever have a "military" victory.

They won a dimplomatic victory becuase the international community walzed in and insisted that Isreal stop attacking. Not because Hezbollah negotiated anything brilliant, but purely because of the ridiculous double standard you and unfortunately many many others employ in situations like this.



Um. Exactly. Which is why they shouldn't have been allowed to win.

What part of this is confusing to you? Hezbollah "won", not because Isreal couldn't defeat them, but because Isreal was prevented from doing so. You, and people like you handed that victory to Hezbollah, and by proxy to Syria and Iran.

Congratulations.



Those positions were strengthed because the western international community has once again shown that they are unwilling to actually fight for something that needs to be fought for. If the west had simply said: "Well. Lebanon shouldn't have allowed Hezbollah to gain that much power", kinda shrugged its shoulders and let Isreal pound the area into the stone age, it would not be seen as a victory for Hezbollah. It would not be seen as a victory for Syria. It would be seen as an example of what happens when you allow extremists to gain control in your country and a warning to other nations not to do the same.

But. Because of people like you, we handed the bad guys yet another victory. When the hell will you get this? It's just not that hard...



Wow. That's what they wanted to do. That's what you and people like you argued they couldn't do. You do realize which side you're on, right? I said at the very start of this thing that the worst solution possible would be if the UN stepped in and enforced a cease fire that didnot require the complete disarmament and dissolution of Hezbollah, perhaps even holding the leaders of the military actions taken by hezbollah for war crimes as a result of their actions. Anything short of that would be a loss. And sure enough, that's more or less what the UN did.


You're arguing as though Isreal chose to stop attacking and chose to limit its actions. Isreal was forced to do so by the international reaction to the action. They were forced to by the overwhelming opposition to their actions and overwhelming criticism. It's interesting that you recognize that the only way such military action would work is if it was allowed to be "complete", yet also seem to be right there on the sidelines with the people bashing Isreal for attempting to do so.

It has to be more then just Israel choosing to do this. Other nations have to get off their collective butts and realize that only through strong and committed military action can groups like Hezbollah be defeated. As long as so many in the UN keep losing their nerve as soon as a few civilian casualties are shown on the news, groups like Hezbollah will continue to "win", continue to gain ground, and continue to gain power in the world.

Your question implies an assumption based on your own ideology. Remove the "without any impact on Hezbollah" part and it's a valid question. With that phrase, it's equivalent to asking someone when they're going to stop beating their wife...

The only reason Israel's attacks didn't significantly impact Hezbollah was because the international community stepped in before they could impact Hezbollah. It criticized every attack Israel made. It insisted that corridors for aid be opened up (which somewhat defeats the purpose of closing supply lines in the first place, right?). It started the process of a cease fire from the day they started, essentially ensuring that Hezbollah knew they only had to hang in for a short amount of time to "win".

Any local force can win any conflict if it knows that the opponent will be hampered by international attention to civilian casualties and that the same international community will force a stop to hostilities in a relatively short amount of time. They know this. That's why they know they can do something like the raids that started this whole conflict and get away with it. Because they know that no matter how Israel reacts, they'll win. Not because they're stronger or because Israel can't defeat them, but because they know that Israel will be stopped short of victory.



How about you turn that question around? Are you saying that nations only have a right to wage "limited war"? Is that really a great idea? Exactly how many issues have been resolved via limited warfar? I'd argue strongly that limited warfare causes more problems then it solves, yet your very question implies that only limited warfare should ever be conducted.


That's where you (and the rest of the Liberal West) have gone wrong. You've arrived at some conclusion that limited conflicts are somehow inherently "better" then unlimited ones. And in your zeal to ensure that all conflicts are limited you've forgotten that in some cases the only resolution is an unlimited conflict in which one side absolutely defeats the other.

Alrighty:

How long should the international community should've have stood by and watched while Israel destroyed a country?



Bastards.



Yeah, civilian casualties, like, who cares? Bastards...



Yep.



Yep.



Yep. Crazy, I know...



In some cases, I agree. WWII was one example were one *alliance of countries* had to be defeated militarily. And even then, no one tried to eradicate all the Germans. Just to get the ***** out of power. And even then, Germans were treated as POWs. Until the bombing of Dresden and Hiroshima, civilian casulaties were limited by teh Allied forces. It wasn't, even then, "unlimited warfare".

So, here are some examples of unlimited warfares:

Japan's wars in the 30-45: Rapes, torture, thousands of Chinese women taken as sex slaves, etc...

WWI was the biggest and most pointless butchery in the history of the world, and for what? For a few hundred yards in Eastern France...

Rwanda, were the international community put no pressure whatsoever on anyone to stop. Great result there.

The wars in Congo: millions of dead, a country completely ****** up, child soldiers on drugs, and its been going on for 10 years. Great.


The problem is you simplify everything. You mix Hezbollah and the war on terror, you mix Hezbollah and the Hamas problem, you think somehow you can label anyone a "terrorist" and bam! all they deserve is death. The world is so much more complicated than that...

If you really want to get to rid of Hezbollah, you've got two options:

- You make Israel withdraw from Lebanon (the whole of it), as they are meant to do, and then help the Lebanese governement get a proper army, and rebuild the economy of the country. Hezbollah will fade out.

- You wage all-out war on Iran and Syria.

That's it. Flattening Lebanon will not change ****. The source of teh problem if Syria and Iran.

Not Lebanon.

FTL , actually, but keep thinking that.

If you're going to make a strawman argument, at least take the time to stuff a little hay into there before knocking it over.

I was just linking an article about that I thought was a step in the right direction.

I wasn't making a strawman argument, just saying that I thougt this move by Israel was good, and more of it would be great.

Ah, my bad :-)

Cool, now I can read achileez's post. Fascinating stuff...