Text size:

Israel wants peace, victory

BY MICHAEL ROTHFELD | Newsday Staff Correspondent

August 13, 2006

Acting Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert attends the weekly cabinet meeting in his Jerusalem office. (AP Photo / March 26, 2006)

SHEAR YESHUV, Israel - Under international pressure to make peace with Lebanon and domestic pressure to defeat Hezbollah, Israel moved in both directions yesterday.

The government prepared for a cabinet vote this morning on the draft cease-fire resolution approved Friday at the United Nations and supported by Prime Minister Ehud Olmert. And it swarmed Lebanon with troops while hitting it with air strikes.

The escalation, experts said, was intended to counter the effects of Israel's failure to stop Hezbollah from launching rockets into Israel and its inability to drive the militia from southern Lebanon in a month of war.

"Israel wants also to end this war closer to clear-cut victory, and the way to do it is by establishing the flag on the ground," said Uri Bar Joseph, a professor of international relations at Haifa University. "It is important both for the Israeli domestic public opinion and how the Arab world sees the situation."

Indeed, the Israel Defense Forces reported reaching the Litani River yesterday, 18 miles from the border, while Hezbollah fired 60 rockets, far fewer than in recent days.

Lt. Gen. Dan Halutz, Israel's military chief of staff, told reporters at a military base in Rosh Pinah that "operations" in Lebanon could go on for a week or more, until a UN and Lebanese force begins to arrive. Other Israeli officials have indicated the offensive could wind down by tomorrow.

"There was no decision that this gap is a cease-fire," Halutz said. "Despite the price we're paying, we are achieving our goals. We're in a war."

At home, conservative Israeli politicians yesterday began criticizing the war as a failure and Olmert for buckling to U.S. and international pressure to back down before crippling Hezbollah.

Israel said its cabinet would agree to the resolution as domestic polling revealed growing dissatisfaction with the war effort and with Olmert. But his government portrayed the UN deal as favorable to Israel because it requires Hezbollah, which has dominated life in southern Lebanon, to move north of the Litani; demands the group's disarmament; and would prevent the flow of weapons to the militia from Syria and Iran.

"That's a major change in the strategic reality on the northern border," said Marc Regev, the Foreign Ministry spokesman.

If the resolution's aim of neutralizing Hezbollah is achieved, Israelis may end up viewing the war as productive, despite the loss of more than 130 soldiers and civilian lives and the popular perception that it was mismanaged by the military, experts said.

"If it will be carried as it's written, it will be good for Israel, because then the Hezbollah will have no military presence up to the Litani River," said Isaac Ben-Israel, a Tel Aviv University professor and former general in the Israeli Air Force. "But I'm not so sure that this will really be the case. The UN may not be strong enough."

In the aftermath of the war, Israelis expect upheaval that will determine the future of Olmert's stewardship. Already, critics are asking - for political gain and otherwise - whether the reserve soldiers the country relies upon in times of war were adequately trained during the past six years, when patrolling Palestinian villages and entering houses of would-be suicide bombers in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip was the main focus.

"The onslaught of the opposition has begun," said Itamar Rabinovich, president of Tel Aviv University. "There's going to be a lot of acrimony."

The prime minister is likely to shoulder some of the blame for what the Israeli media and public have seen as indecisive conduct of the war, which began with lofty goals such as disarming Hezbollah that were scaled back when they were not realized. Olmert also will have to contend with a damaged economy in the north and a perception that his government did not adequately evacuate and care for residents there.

But Olmert may survive, at least for a time, until the UN resolution is tested. In part, he may remain viable because the country has no obvious leader to replace him; Israel's famous warrior-politicians, men such as Yitzhak Rabin and Ariel Sharon, have all exited the scene. Galia Golan, a professor emeritus of international politics at Hebrew University, said there more likely will be a shake-up in the military, whose initial strategy of crippling Hezbollah with air attacks proved inadequate.

"I assume that heads are going to roll here," she said.

Resolution Highlights

"Full cessation of hostilities." Hezbollah must stop all attacks and Israel must end "all offensive military operations." Does not set a timeline to end the fighting.

15,000 Lebanese troops and the existing UN force in Lebanon to deploy in south Lebanon as Israeli troops withdraw, and the current 2,000-member UN force to be expanded into a better-armed force with up to 15,000 troops.

Eventually disarming Hezbollah and creating a buffer zone from the border up to 18 miles inside Lebanon, where only the Lebanese army and UN troops would be allowed to carry weapons.

Impose an arms embargo that would allow only the Lebanese government to bring weapons into the country.

"Unconditional release" of two Israeli soldiers abducted by Hezbollah on July 12. Does not call for the release of Lebanese prisoners held by Israel, saying only that the issue must be "settled." The international community would extend humanitarian and financial aid to Lebanon and assist with the return of nearly 1 million Lebanese displaced by the war.

E-mail

Reprint

Get breaking news | Most popular stories | Dining and Travel deals all via e-mail!

Related links

Related topic galleries: Ariel Sharon, Wars and Interventions, Civil Unrest, Armed Forces, Religious Conflicts, Personal Weapon Control, International Relations

Popular stories

The fight for civil rights

NEWS QUIZ