Enter Hizbullah
Will Hizbullah's kidnap of two Israeli soldiers strengthen the Palestinian position vis-à-vis Israel, asks Serene Assir
Escalating violence in South Lebanon may finally set the ball rolling across a beleaguered Middle East, as the Lebanese Shia resistance movement Hizbullah captures two Israeli soldiers in a cross-border attack which the Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert described as "an act of war" that would elicit a "very, very, very painful" response.
The Hizbullah raid, in which up to eight Israeli soldiers were killed and 21 wounded, comes less than three weeks after the capture of Corporal Gilad Shalit on 25 June, which resulted in a qualitative Israeli escalation -- Operation Summer Rain -- of violence against Palestinians.
Reacting to news of yesterday's abduction, the Israeli army sent ground troops into South Lebanon while Hizbullah reportedly launched rockets into northern Israel. Olmert and Israeli defence officials blame the whole of Lebanon for the operation, claiming it was an attack by a sovereign state on Israel and that the Lebanese government, of which Hizbullah is a part, "must bear full responsibility".
Speaking to Al-Ahram Weekly, leading members of Hizbullah did not seem overly concerned with the threat.
"Should Israel try and carry out an invasion of South Lebanon it will face deep problems," said Ali Al-Fayad, a senior member of the movement's politburo. "Our strategy has been clear for a long time. We captured the soldiers so that they could be exchanged for Lebanese and Arabs held in Israeli prisons."
According to Hizbullah Israel holds some 2,000 Lebanese prisoners, a figure confirmed by independent sources.
Al-Fayad also cited Israel's ongoing occupation of the Shebaa Farms in South Lebanon as a reason for the abductions. "Until our legitimate demands are fulfilled, we will continue to resist," he told the Weekly.
There are glaring parallels with the situation in Gaza as Israel threatens a wide-ranging military campaign inside Lebanese territory following the capture of the soldiers, while both the Palestinian resistance and Hizbullah say they are holding Israeli soldiers to use as a bargaining chip to secure the release of political prisoners.
Asked whether the Hizbullah operation involved coordination with Hamas, Mohamed Nazzal, Hamas's representative in Lebanon told the Weekly that while "technically speaking there was no coordination, the Palestinian and Lebanese situations have some things in common. Both operations were done with the objective of releasing prisoners held by the Israelis."
Al-Fayad also suggested that Hizbullah could be taking advantage of Israel being militarily overstretched. "The fact that Israel is involved in two military operations at once can only work against its interest," he said.
Joseph Samaha, journalist and editor-in-chief of the Lebanese newspaper Al-Akhbar agrees, arguing that "the Palestinian crisis only gives greater legitimacy to Hizbullah's action".
"The brutality of the Israeli re-invasion of Gaza has struck deep in Lebanese society, and it has engendered genuine anger among the majority of the country's citizens."
On the mood in Lebanon, Samaha said that, "the majority are behind Hizbullah." There appears to be little fear in the country, he continued, though there will be an inevitable drop in tourist numbers. Despite a year in which Lebanese society has seemed increasingly fractured, Samaha believes the Hizbullah action has succeeded in generating pride among the Lebanese.
In 1982 the Israeli invasion took Lebanon by storm. Even though the Israeli troops swept through the southern Lebanon quickly, it took over three months before they captured Beirut. Hizbullah at the time was a nascent force, but in 2000 it became the first Arab movement to successfully liberate occupied land without a peace treaty with Israel. In the same year Hizbullah snatched the bodies of three Israeli soldiers and a businessman which it exchanged in 2004 for hundreds of Lebanese and other Arabs detained in Israeli Jails.
In a press conference yesterday Hizbullah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah said that Israel's refusal to release Lebanese prisoners was the main reason for the kidnap. He explained that the aim of the operation was twofold: "to pressure for the release of remaining Lebanese prisoners, and to shed light on the suffering of 10,000 Arab political prisoners and their families."
Nasrallah said that though Hizbullah was committed to quiet on the Lebanese front it has always insisted that the release of prisoners was a strategic and moral goal.
"This is something we were committed to even before [the present attack on] Gaza. However, we also hope that it represents an act of solidarity with the Palestinians."
For the first time Nasrallah pointed to a linkage between the Palestinian and Lebanese tracks, suggesting that Israel should start simultaneous negotiations for the release of prisoners with both Hizbullah and the Palestinians.
Yesterday Olmert ruled out any negotiations, insisting that Israel will not succumb to what he called terrorism. "This was the case yesterday, and is the case today," he said. Whether it will be the case tomorrow, though, is anyone's guess. (see pp. 6, 7, 10, 11, 12, 13)
Additional reporting by Amira Howeidy
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