Thread: Who won it?

Originally Posted by parihaka

I disagree that Israel lost the PR or Media war. As far as I can see it's a stalemate. Hezbollah and their supporters would have claimed victory if one fighter had survived. The media given to chastising Israel would have continued to do so no matter what the outcome, those who support Israel have continued to do so.
No one on either side has had their opinion changed either way, for all the rhetoric of how Hezbollah gained support. Status quo, a new fight looming, with all players now having openly declared their hand. In this context Israel has gained an advantage because Iran and Syria can now be directly linked to the coming hostilities in the eyes of the world.

I really wish I shared your opinion, but, mate, I just don't.

Originally Posted by Bluesman

I really wish I shared your opinion, but, mate, I just don't.

Just remember Blues, it's a long game, and those who make the decisions don't rely on the popular press for their information
To quote Snipe

And the sides take shape further still

I know whos side I want to be on.

Originally Posted by parihaka

Just remember Blues, it's a long game, and those who make the decisions don't rely on the popular press for their information
To quote Snipe
I know whos side I want to be on.

Yeah, but man, I AM on the inside. I don't get the news from the press.

And I don't see this as anything but a horrid outcome.

But I'll grant you this: it isn't endgame. Hell, we're just getting cranked up. But after this...it'll be a lot harder than it was before Olmert screwed the pooch.

A greta opportunity WASTED.

I am duly humbled by your citation Parihaka.

My take, such as it's worth:

What Israel accomplished IMO was to kill a hell of a lot more Muslims than Muslims killed Jews. On it's very face that is a good thing for them, but it's hardly what they were after.

The fight also helped them out in one backhanded way though. Because of the mauling the Merks took at the hands of modern ATGMs the jews will now have the chance to up-armor them WITHOUT it being a matter of here and now life and death survival for them, as has more normally been the case for them.
Israel took Hezbollah too lightly, which is stupid, cause if anyone in the IDF would've asked any ME expert they'd have told the jews Hezbollah is a kick ass light infantry force. Whoops. Learn from it, and move on.

<Broken Record Mode/ON>

ISRAEL OR THE WEST WILL HAVE ANOTHER CHANCE AT THIS.

This was just a proxy war IMO. The real combatants were Iran and the US.

Everyone knows it. It's all just a prelude for what's to come. Call it a strategic reconnaissance by fire.


<Broken Record Mode/OFF>

Originally Posted by Khan Sahab

In the very beginning, Israel would declare that this is the war to end the extremist "Hezbollah" completly and to destry it's rocket firing capacity.

That was never more than Israeli propoganda. You know that. We all know that.

The MOMENT Israel is serious about destroying Hezbollah ALL DOUBT about their intentions will be instantly removed.

Originally Posted by M21Sniper

That was never more than Israeli propoganda. You know that. We all know that.

The MOMENT Israel is serious about destroying Hezbollah ALL DOUBT about their intentions will be instantly removed.

Then they should not have said it's what they were about. No good can come of that mistake.

Likewise, the two men. THAT should have been the starting point of ANY negotiation.

SCENE: Israeli news conference. Olmert on the podium. Fresh-faced but hard-assed young fighter pilot one pace right flank rear.

OLMERT: We're going to keep destroying things in Lebanon until we have our men back, and by God, if they're so much as missing their hats, we're adding tonnage until we figure the deal is square. We're not tired yet [looks over his shoulder at the fighter jock] - you're not tired yet, are you, son? - and we can keep this up until we're down to unsticking any two Leb bricks that are still cemented together.

THAT is our position. Non-negotiable. It is the basis for any other talking. I'm not taking any questions, and by God, I don't think I've left any, either. See you after the war.

And he walks out, with the fighter driver following, smirking and setting his watch.

It would've been AWESOME. And SCARY.

Many Lebanese fear next conflict will be with Hezbollah
By Hannah Allam and Leila Fadel
McClatchy Newspapers

BEIRUT, Lebanon - Glossy new billboards touting Hezbollah's "divine victory" over Israel line Beirut's highways. The capital's famed nightspots are full again with scantily clad students drinking to make up for a month lost to war. Leaders of the country's political dynasties appear nightly on live television, urging their weary constituents to rebuild, forgive and move on.

But this rosy image of resilience, a week after a U.N.-brokered cease-fire brought a halt to Israeli airstrikes, masks a growing realization among Lebanese that the next battle Lebanon faces probably will be among its own.

From beautifully appointed salons in Beirut to the scorched villages of the south, there is blame, aimed at Hezbollah and its Iranian and Syrian patrons as well as Israel and its American backers. There's also concern among Lebanon's disparate ethnic and sectarian groups about Hezbollah's newfound power after the 34-day conflict.

"What's happened in the last month and a half has polarized Lebanon even more and caused people to speak out a little more radically," said Rami Khouri, a political analyst and columnist for the Daily Star, Lebanon's main English-language newspaper. "The war we just had heightened the concerns of people. None of these are new concerns."

Even before Hezbollah provoked the latest conflict by capturing two Israeli soldiers July 12 in a deadly operation, Lebanon had been mired in a thorny national dialogue over putting to rest resentments from its 15-year civil war and divvying up power in the vacuum left last year by Syria's withdrawal. There was excitement over the pro-democracy movement known as the Cedar Revolution and talk of national reconciliation, but both were fizzling long before Hezbollah's raid. Israel's broad attacks finished them off.

In Lebanon's latest war-ravaged landscape, age-old tensions that were never properly addressed are more raw and public than ever. Many Christians grumble aloud that Israel should have "finished the job." Sunni Muslims are caught between satisfaction at seeing Israel taken down a notch and the terror of being sidelined by Hezbollah, an Iranian-bankrolled Shiite Muslim force. Shiites, who form the backbone of Hezbollah's support base, were the conflict's biggest victims, losing relatives, homes and jobs.

Many Lebanese from all backgrounds fear that Hezbollah, now the most powerful political and military force in the country, will inch back to its early goal of establishing Islamic rule over Lebanon.

Misbah Ahdab, a Sunni legislator from the ruling parliamentary bloc, said Hezbollah was creating "a parallel system" instead of making overtures to back the central government. Fear of angering Hezbollah is keeping many politicians silent, he said, even though they fret privately over the future of a country led by a militant Islamist group.

"It's totally ridiculous to begin rebuilding again when it's going to be destroyed in two years," he said. "And people are talking about unity."

Already, the militant Shiites of Hezbollah effectively rule the country: They alone have the power to keep the Lebanese end of the cease-fire, endless piles of dollars for reconstruction and the vast support of regional Arabs, who were so thrilled to see Israel bloodied that they overlooked non-Arab Iran's financing of their triumph.

In Lebanon, many non-Shiites are watching to see how Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah deals with the new power he's been handed. Nasrallah, keenly aware of the concerns over his stature, quickly set about portraying his militia's battlefield success as a point of national pride that transcends Lebanon's strictly drawn ethnic and sectarian lines, but not everyone is persuaded.

"I can understand that people, the fanatics, support Nasrallah," Druze leader Walid Jumblatt said in an interview. "OK, he's saying he did well, and he did well. But will he offer this victory to a Lebanese state or will he offer this victory to himself? I want the state."

The Lebanese state, however, is plagued by infighting and a weak military that one government official privately described as "a bunch of Boy Scouts." Nasrallah, whose televised addresses became more presidential as the fighting raged on, overshadows the embattled Prime Minister Fuad Saniora, best remembered during the conflict for crying on camera during a speech to Arab foreign ministers.

Since the introduction of a fragile truce, Saniora and his allies in the Western-backed ruling bloc known as the March 14 Forces have struggled to reclaim power. The Lebanese military was deployed in southern Lebanon, Hezbollah's heartland, but most acknowledge that its presence is cosmetic. The army is outgunned by Hezbollah militants and doesn't have the authority to search for the militia's weapons.

There's also growing concern that Hezbollah's gloating - on multilingual billboards, in official statements and on Arabic-language satellite TV - not only will invite Israeli retaliation but also will aggravate Lebanon's internal strife. Lebanese don't want another round of Israeli airstrikes and most don't seem to have the stomach for another civil war, though both possibilities can't be discarded as Lebanon faces an uncertain future.

"Hezbollah is claiming victory at halftime," said Hilal Khashan, an expert on Hezbollah who teaches at the American University of Beirut. "The war is not over yet."

Source

Originally Posted by Bluesman

It would've been AWESOME. And SCARY.

Olmert ****ed up, no doubt about it. He tried to play two games at once, and the military one was just for show.
Israel as a country won't make that mistake again, its military won't let them.

Anyone heard from BR yet?

Originally Posted by parihaka

Anyone heard from BR yet?

No, and I'm getting tense.

I think I must be turning into Troung

lthough psychological warfare is not a modern media phenomenon, the spinning since Hezbollah ambushed a routine IDF patrol within Israeli territory in mid-July has been dizzying. Israel's air force demonstrated surprising knowledge and deftness in leveling Hezbollah's strongholds and was far more surgical than NATO bombers in Kosovo, let alone Russian forces in Chechnya. Nevertheless, Israel has been chastised for a "disproportionate reaction" while simultaneously being mocked as ineffectual. Somehow, when Americans bomb targets for weeks they are "softening the enemy," yet when Israelis deploy airpower before their infantry enters, even Israeli journalists bemoan Israel's failure. On the ground, Israel has defeated Hezbollah repeatedly, yet any time Israeli soldiers fall or victory is not achieved instantly, reportorial naysayers declare Israel a paper tiger. Four decades of guerilla warfare from Algeria and Vietnam to Afghanistan and Iraq teach that terrorists using civilians as flak jackets cannot be defeated on the fly. Nevertheless, the media's immature and premature compulsion to give instant analysis leads to a perpetual scorekeeping that ignores the chaotic, zigzag nature of even the most successful of wars — let alone the fact that many wars are won and lost in the months of diplomacy and repositioning which come after the last shot has been fired.

In the war's sickest twist, the tragic deaths of Lebanese civilians at Qana became Hezbollah's greatest victory. Israel's spokespeople appeared grimfaced and apologetic; Hezbollah's spokesmen seemed gleefully eager to press their new propaganda advantage rather than actually mourning their own people's deaths. They even doubled their claims of the number of civilians that had actually been killed. Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Siniora picked up some acting tips from his Hezbollah colleagues, tearfully reporting to the Arab League that 40 Lebanese had been killed in another strike, only to adjust the figure down to one shortly thereafter.

At first glance, Hezbollah's spinmeisters seemed masterful. Too many reporters echoed the jihadists' line of the day — pictures of bombed areas and unfortunate civilians caught in the crossfire were too tempting to broadcast, even though they offered no perspective on the dimensions of the damage or the causes of the conflict. Television footage suggests Beirut is ruined although most Israeli bombing targeted only Hezbollah's southern Beirut stronghold. Moreover, Israelis themselves sweat every flicker in the world-opinion meter. Israeli newspapers are filled with constant second-guessing of IDF tactics and obsessive woe-is-me laments about harsh world criticism and Israel's PR failures.

Yet, like Yasser Arafat six years ago when he turned from negotiations back to terror, and like his fellow Islamofascists in Hamas-controlled Gaza, Hassan Nasrallah miscalculated. His strategy backfired. Hezbollah's unprovoked assault, the missile barrage targeting civilians, and the fear that Israel's Lebanon withdrawal and Gaza withdrawal had emboldened extremists and invited violence all united Israel's famously fractious society. Israeli morale remained incredibly high despite the national sense of loss each time a citizen died in the conflict. This unity endured even in the face of the inevitable carping about decision-making, and Israel's frustrating inability to prevent rocket launches from Lebanon and Gaza.

In visiting air bases, the front lines, and the home front, all I heard was "ein breira”: We have no alternative. There were expressions of patience, determination, and a renewed idealism. Air Force commanders insisted they would continue trying to limit civilian suffering, not to score unwinnable PR points with the world but because "we have to respect ourselves." A pregnant woman in the Northern town of Safed, who endured two weeks of stultifying heat before she and the other 20 men, women, and children — who crowded into her local shelter received an air conditioner — vowed, "We’ll stay down here as long as it takes, as long as Tsahal [the IDF] makes sure to win."
More broadly, all of Israeli society mobilized to encourage the soldiers and embrace the 1 million northerners whose lives and livelihoods were targeted by the missiles Hezbollah delivered for its masters in Teheran and Damascus. Reflecting the realities of Israel's Western-style, consumer-oriented liberal democracy, 57 varieties of volunteer initiatives bubbled up from the grassroots. What they lacked in coordination they compensated for in creativity. A Russian-Israeli tycoon, Arkady Gaydamark, established a tent-city and amusement park for 6,000 displaced northerners in southern Israel. The Supersol supermarket chain sold consumers food baskets to donate to the needy in the north. Hundreds of families placed ads for free in newspapers offering to host refugees from the missiles. Moms started summer camps for children of mobilized soldiers or mounted food drives. And thousands of individuals participated in dozens of other initiatives to assist.

In Safed, a poverty-stricken city in the best of times, one of the most impressive corps of young volunteers swooping down on the city came from an organization called "Lev Echad," or One Heart. The organization formed last year to comfort the families from Gaza displaced by the unilateral withdrawal — and consisted mostly of the "orange," national religious anti-disengagement youth. Now, the organization mobilized more than 1,000 young people of all political and religious stripes to deliver food, entertain children in bomb shelters, and care for the elderly, whose caretakers had fled the rockets. Watching two busloads of volunteers arrive in Safed with the high spirits of the cavalry coming to rescue their comrades, it was clear that Hamas and Hezbollah had stumbled into giving Israel a gift no Israeli politician was otherwise capable of delivering.

Just as Osama Bin Laden imposed a sense of camaraderie on Americans after 9/11, Israelis are now determined, united, and focused. They healed the searing wounds of last August's Gaza disengagement and resolutely faced the threat posed not just by their nihilistic neighbors, but by the dastardly manipulators in Syria and Iran.

Such national purpose will outlast any fluctuating headlines from a spin-centered, media-wired universe, suffering from collective Attention Deficit Disorder. Such morale proves that terrorists may be the most effective patriotism-generators in the West today. Terrorism terrifies but it also galvanizes. That overlooked and unintended side effect may in the long run help explain the decline of the Islamofascists throughout the world.

Source

Originally Posted by Bluesman

No, and I'm getting tense.

They've still got large numbers of troops in there and as he's regular he'll be among the last out I suppose

Originally Posted by parihaka

They've still got large numbers of troops in there and as he's regular he'll be among the last out I suppose

He's a called-up reservist. I know they're still busy as hell, but I sure would like to hear from him.

Originally Posted by Bluesman

He's a called-up reservist.

Didn't realise that. I thought with all his training recently that he was regular army.