COMMENT An accident waiting
to happen By Ian Williams
With the Israeli bombing of a United
Nations camp and the killing of four UN
peacekeepers, we really do seem to be in a "deja
vu all over again" phase. Already UN Secretary
General Kofi Annan is under attack for condemning
the "apparently deliberate targeting by Israel
Defense Forces [IDF] of a UN observer post".
It is reminiscent of the trouble his
predecessor Boutros Boutros-Ghali got himself into
last time the Israelis tried shock and awe on
Lebanon in 1996, when he failed to suppress a
report that said pretty much the same thing about
the IDF shelling of the UN post in Qana, which
killed some 106 Lebanese civilians.
It is
worth remembering that of all UN secretaries
general, Annan has done most to end Israel's
isolation in the organization and
maintained the closest
relations with Israel's friends in the United
States. In the end, however, he is also a head who
sets great store by protecting UN staff, and so
the palpable anger of his statement is entirely
understandable.
"This coordinated
artillery and aerial attack on a long-established
and clearly marked UN post at Khiyam occurred
despite personal assurances given to me by
[Israeli] Prime Minister Ehud Olmert that UN
positions would be spared Israeli fire.
Furthermore, General Alain Pellegrino, the UN
force commander in south Lebanon, had been in
repeated contact with Israeli officers throughout
the day on Tuesday, stressing the need to protect
that particular UN position from attack."
So to accept that it was yet another
accident presupposes a level of incompetence or
insubordination in the Israeli army that should
see some serious courts-martial, but never does.
So what could be the motive? It is clear
that there are many in the IDF with a profound
contempt for the UN and all it stands for, and who
would not shed many tears at such an accident. It
may also rankle that the United Nations Interim
Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) has, in the dearth of
Western reporters from much of south Lebanon,
provided independent corroboration of many
incidents of IDF attacks on civilians. One only
has to think of the fate of the USS Liberty in
1967 [1] for being in a position to observe what
the IDF was up to.
And, most sinister of
all, there are many Israelis - including the
government only a few days ago - who do not want
an international force between them and their
targets in Lebanon, who would have no great
scruples about bombing a UN compound "accidentally
on purpose".
This time, the "collateral
damage" is not just four dead UN personnel. The
bombing scotches any realistic chance of a
reinforced UN or multinational peacekeeping force
- which it is worth remembering that Israel itself
opposed until a few days ago, and which the war
party in Israel sees as a potential obstacle to
their attempts to emulate Ariel Sharon's
disastrous invasion in 1982. (See Israeli peace
group's Gush Shalom's ad in Ha'aretz at the end of
the article.)
Already, while many
countries have endorsed the general idea of
putting foreign troops on the Lebanese side of the
border, there has been a complete lack of specific
volunteers - for the understandable reasons that
the attack on Khiyam now so forcibly demonstrates.
The Fijians and Ghanaians make lots of
money out of providing peacekeepers for UNIFIL and
seem to think weekly humiliation by the Israelis
and Hezbollah is worth it. There are few serious
military powers that would tolerate sending their
troops for IDF target practice, let alone
Hezbollah attacks. And who knows, if any were so
bold as to put in contingents, they may well stand
up to Israeli incursions as well.
Some
Israel supporters are already arguing that the
bombing could not have been deliberate because it
was a public relations disaster for Israel. Excuse
me, but only an American or Israeli commentator
could say that. Manifestly, for the rest of the
world, the whole Israeli campaign is a PR
disaster, with massive majorities even in Tony
Blair's Britain regarding the Israeli attack as a
massively disproportionate reaction, let alone how
Israel's assault is turning Hezbollah into the
toast of the Third World.
There is some
added piquancy that both the Lebanese and Iraqi
prime ministers (until this week at least
champions of the new democratic Middle East) are
condemning Israel's assault.
US Secretary
of State Condoleezza Rice's statement that it was
"too early" for a ceasefire, when only 500 were
dead and countless more dismembered, should go
down with Madeleine Albright's since-regretted
statement that the death of hundreds of thousands
of Iraqi children as a result of sanctions was "a
price worth paying".
Since Annan is
already going at the end of the year, which puts
him beyond reach of US Ambassador John Bolton's
veto, we can but hope that he will not be
browbeaten by Rice, Bolton or President George W
Bush, but will use the sacrifice of the UN
observers to shame the Security Council into
demanding an immediate ceasefire.
And who
knows, while he is still angry, he may wish to
remind them that Israel was defying UN Resolution
242 (Israel to remove itself from territories
acquired in the 1967 war) for many decades before
Resolution 1559 (free and fair presidential
election in Lebanon without foreign interference
and all remaining foreign forces to withdraw from
Lebanon), and that it has to be a crucial
foundation for any peace settlement for the
region.
Back to
1982 Then: The war was
prepared well in advance. This time:
The same.
Then: We
went to war only to protect "the peace of
Galilee". This time: We go to war
to protect Haifa and Afula, too.
Then: We waited for a
provocation (the attempt on the life of Israeli
ambassador to Britain Shlomo Argov). This
time:We waited for a provocation (the
capture of two soldiers).
Then: "We shall advance only
40 kilometers in order to eliminate the
Katyushas." This time: "We shall
advance only a few kilometers in order to
eliminate the rockets."
Then: Ariel Sharon acted
behind the back of the cabinet. This
time: Olmert, Defense Minister Amir Peretz
and army chief of staff Dan Halutz act behind the
back of the ministers.
Then:
We destroyed Lebanon. This time:
We are destroying Lebanon.
Then: Only the Palestinian
Liberation Organization profited from the war. A
few years later they returned to Palestine.
This time: Only Hezbollah will
profit from the war. Its prestige in the Arab
world increases every day.
Then: We were stuck in the
quagmire for 18 years. For how long shall
we be stuck this time? The question is posed
by Gush Shalom of the Israeli Peace Block in a
large advertisement published in Ha'aretz
newspaper on Wednesday.
Note 1. During the Six
Day War between Israel and the Arab states, the
intelligence ship USS Liberty was attacked for 75
minutes in international waters by Israeli
aircraft and motor torpedo boats. Thirty-four men
died and 174 were wounded.
Ian
Williams is author of Deserter: Bush's War
on Military Families, Veterans and His Past,
Nation Books, New York.
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2006 Asia Times Online Ltd. All rights reserved.
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