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Rescue workers stand near a man killed when a rocket exploded near his vehicle in
Israeli flags and rocket remnants make up a memorial to 12 IDF soldiers killed by a
Haifa, July 23, 2006.
direct hit in Kfar Giladi on Aug. 28, 2006.
A,
Year Later
Assessing the Lebanon war: Was it a wake-up call for Israel?
Leslie Susser
Jewish Telegraphic Agency
Jerusalem
0
ne year after the Second Lebanon
War, Israel's northern front is
quiet; United Nations forces are
patrolling the border area and Hezbollah
fighters have been pushed back deep inside
Lebanese territory. That's the good news.
On the other side of the equation, Prime
Minister Ehud Olmert is still under pres-
sure to resign for his poor conduct of the
war; home-front defenses are suffering
from neglect; Hezbollah is rearming with
bigger and better rockets; and there have
been no signs of life from the two Israeli
soldiers whose abduction on July 12, 2006,
sparked the 34-day conflict.
One year later, these questions remain:
• How has Israel's performance in the
war affected its standing in a hostile envi-
ronment?
• Is U.N. Security Council Resolution
1701, which brought the fighting to an
end, proving effective?
•What are the chances of a prisoner
exchange?
•What has been done to bring the Israel
Defense Forces up to speed and to bolster
home defenses?
•And on the political front, can Olmert
survive as prime minister?
In the fighting, 119 Israeli soldiers and
44 civilians were killed. Israeli forces
proved unable to stop daily Hezbollah
rocket barrages on civilian population
centers; national leadership was indeci-
sive; ground troops did not perform well;
and the captured soldiers, Eldad Regev
and Ehud Goldwasser, were not freed.
Most experts maintain that, on balance,
the war hurt Israel's deterrent capac-
ity. The problem is particularly acute on
the Syrian front, where President Bashar
Assad has been building up his arsenal of
ground-to-ground, anti-aircraft and anti-
tank missiles. The Israeli concern is that
Assad, given his perception of the Israeli
performance in Lebanon, may miscalcu-
late his military strength relative to Israel's
and start hostilities.
In recent months, the Israeli govern-
ment has sent Assad two clear messages:
Israel has no intention of attacking Syria;
and, if war does break out, Syria would be
far more vulnerable to Israeli firepower
than Hezbollah because of its state appa-
ratus and infrastructure. Israeli intelli-
gence believes the messages were received,
but no one on the Israeli side is discount-
ing the possibility of another war in the
north this summer.
In the immediate aftermath of the war,
Olmert presented U.N. Resolution 1701 as
a major strategic gain. It placed a "robust"
U.N. force of more than 13,000 troops in
the border area previously occupied by
Hezbollah, creating an effective buffer
between Israel and the Sh'iite militiamen.
Indeed, in the year since the war,
Hezbollah has not fired a single shot
across the border. An isolated rocket
attack on Kiryat Shemona in mid-June
was attributed to a radical Palestinian
faction. Hezbollah fortifications near the
border have been destroyed, and arms
and ammunition found there have been
confiscated.
Olmert says the days are gone when
Hezbollah forces near the border, with
more than 10,000 Katyusha rockets
trained on civilian, military and strategic
targets, could hold Israel captive. A late
June report released by U.N. Secretary
General Ban Ki-moon, however, paints a
more somber picture.
According to Ban, Hezbollah continues
to receive vast quantities of arms from
Syria and Iran in blatant violation of 1701.
Most of the weaponry comes overland
across the Syria-Lebanon border and
includes rockets with a range of more than
150 miles. Hezbollah, according to the
report, apparently is building new posi-
tions outside the U.N. zone from which
it would be able to launch rocket attacks
against Israel.
Israel has complained several times
about the porous nature of the Syria-
Lebanon border, but no one seems to be
doing anything about it. Israel also is con-
cerned about the possible military coordi-
nation among Iran, Syria and Hezbollah.
If Assad were to launch hostilities
later in the summer, Israeli intelligence
believes Hezbollah would join in, and Iran
would provide more weapons and logisti-
cal support.
Ban's report on the fate of the two Israeli
captives is equally downbeat. He is sharply
critical of Hezbollah for not providing
any sign of life from the two soldiers and
says concerns about their fate are grow-
ing. Israeli officials believe that during the
abduction, one of the men may have been
badly wounded.
Contacts between Israel and Hezbollah
through a German intermediary are con-
tinuing, but nothing has been revealed
about the soldiers' conditions. Bargaining
over a prisoner exchange apparently has
yet to get off the ground.
The most dramatic change since the
war has occurred among Israel's mili-
tary forces. Following the criticism of its
performance, the army set up more than
40 internal panels to analyze shortcom-
ings and recommend improvements. As
public protest swelled, Chief of Staff Dan
Halutz, an air force man, resigned and was
replaced by Gabi Ashkenazi, a seasoned
infantry general.
Ashkenazi introduced key changes in
doctrine and training. The notion that
modern wars could be won by firepower
alone was replaced with the classic IDF
doctrine of firepower and ground force
maneuvers. Training of ground forces and
reserves was increased significantly in
light of the modified doctrine. In late May,
the IDF carried out joint exercises on a
scale not seen in years.
There also has been new thinking on
home-front defenses. Dan Meridor, a for-
mer minister for strategic affairs, recently
produced a detailed report, "The Home
Front as Battlefield," in which he argues
that in modern rocket warfare, civilians
are as likely to find themselves on the
front line as soldiers, and that it is incum-
bent on the government to prepare them
psychologically and provide the funding
for their protection.
Gaps in levels of security for rich and
poor could harm national resilience,
Meridor said. But there has been little
government action on building new shel-
ters, making old ones more habitable and
providing funds for the construction of
reinforced rooms in private homes and
apartments.
The big political question in the wake
of the war is whether Olmert can main-
tain his hold on power much longer.
The Winograd Commission, the main
panel investigating the conduct of the
war, issued a scathing interim report in
April that was particularly critical of the
prime minister's performance. By moving
quickly to close ranks in his Kadima Party,
Olmert managed to survive.
Pundits say, however, that if the com-
mittee is as or more scathing in its final
report, expected in August, the prime
minister may have to go. The Labor Party
under the new defense minister, Ehud
Barak, is threatening to bring down the
coalition government — of which Labor is
a key element — if Olmert stays.
For Israel, the Second Lebanon War
undoubtedly was a traumatic experience.
But paradoxically, it may have served as a
timely wake-up call for both the military
and the politicians. As a result, regional
perceptions notwithstanding, the country
may have emerged stronger. I
July 12 2007
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