Israel vs. Lebanon: How it began

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The United Nations map shows Shebaa clearly within Lebanon. (PDF file.)

The residents say they are Lebanese.

The frams region is in territory disputed by Syria and Lebanon.  But note that for Israelis to even get there, they must pass through either Lebanese or Syrian territory, as it is not at all conencted to Israel.

The IDF started it all by capturing some Lebanese guys in Lebanon

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Other prisoners of Israel

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Arab Times? Bahrain News Agency? whatreallyhappend.com?

Are you even trying anymore?

are you?
why not try critizing the content, rather than the source?

Because half of the websites he linked have been proven in the past to have not just anti-Israel bias, but anti-Israel policy?

Because most of the sites he linked aren't actually where he's getting these statements?

Because half of the articles he links are various sources takes on a single incident?

Because all the articles devolve into he-said she-said?

Because most of them take the statements of usually one person and cite it as fact... when they bother citing facts at all. Most of them just make statements with no justification or backup.

Should I go on?

The arabs provoke Israel to attack them. Then, they play victims, and a lot of people in Europe and some in America actually believe them.

ok then, heres something you may find interesting - interview with Hezbollahs leader, thats about as closely sourced as you can get.

http://www.counterpunch.org/nasrallah08172006.html

completely unrelated, but i found this via the links above and hadnt seen it before;

Saddam Hussein's letter to the American people

http://www.uruknet.info/?p=m24800

I think its a little bit more complicated than that!

Aside from the fact that the leader of a terrorist organization is as close to a worthless source as you can get.

Forbes, Yahoo, AFP, Asia Times, Jerusalem Post, SFGate, The Guardian, Amnesty International...

Hezbollah is a resistance movement, created to resists the Israeli occupation of southern Lebanon which began in 1982. If the USA and Israel call them terrorists, that doesn't make it a fact. It's merely more sloganerring BS from two of the most aggressive nations on the planet.

According to a BBC analysis "the party today is a well-structured political organisation with members of parliament"
(from wikipedia)

'terrorist' used in this context is about as worthless a label as you can get.

Here we go again. When will you terrorist lovers learn?

Israel's occupation of Lebanon began when Lebanon was hosting Palestinian terrorists. Israel withdrew from Lebanon due to UN pressure, and Hezbollah was one of many groups that formed in the void.

Hezbollah's original aim was to install a Shi'ite theocracy in Lebanon. It abandoned this for participation in parlimentary government, and once in the parliment, used terror tactics to push its agenda.

Civilian kidnappings, suicide bombings, aircraft hijackings, firing rockets loaded with ball bearings into civilians, deliberately targeting civilian infrastructure... building military infrastructure in civilian areas...



The thing about Hezbollah is that it is not a state, it is a political entity. It does not have an "army", it has a militia. Hezbo militia members are not only indistinguishable from civilians to an outside oberver, Hezbollah itself makes no attempt to distinguish. Why? Because they can claim dead militants as civilian deaths.

So, as was stated, there is no difference between the Hezbollah militia, and the civilians. If Hezbollah refuses to identify themselves and continues to allow Lebanese citizens to get "kidnapped" (read: arrested along with the terrorists because there's no visible difference), then the fault is with Hezbollah rather than Israel.

Liberal Fallacy: Hezbollah's attacks on Israel are justified as it is a legitimate resistance movement.

If, in fact, Hezbollah is legitimate, that means that Hezbollah is a legitimate target. The BEST argument you could make here that would even begin to hold water, is that both sides are morally bankrupt and reprehensible.

Re: Military infrastructure in civilian areas.

Hezbollah does not have the strength to fight Israel directly. Hezbollah's victory in the early 80s was due to their invention of modern terrorism (or their "innovative new ideas about guerilla warfare" if you're a sympathizer), something that had never been seen before and that Israel and the US were unprepared to deal with. Since then, Hezbollah has had few weapons to resort to, aside from propaganda.

This is where building military installations in civilian areas comes in.

Israel cannot fight Hezbollah without hitting these military installations, but due to the location of them, civilian deaths are inevitable and unavoidable. Hezbollah then exploits these deaths for all that they're worth, drumming up support from socialists in Europe and the US, who then call for Israel to quit it.

And this propaganda is an effective weapon. Israel crushed Hezbollah in the recent war militarily. Hezbollah's propaganda turned international opinion against them, forcing an early pull out.

But don't take my word for it - take the words of the people who've managed to put together photographic evidence that Hezbollah stages all their footage, the foreign journalists who've been menaced and had their footage stolen from them when they dared film things that didn't portray Hezbollah in a positive light.

I leave you with this.

Hezbollah is the world's most dangerous terrorist agency because they've been able to build themselves a shield of legit-ness. While Hamas and Al Qaeda are considered terrorist organizations universally, Hezbollah has been able to pull the wool over the eyes of a disturbing number of nations and people.

Why do the pro-war, right-wing folks always assume that those who deal with facts must love terrorists?


That was one of the excuses they gave, yes.


Completely incorrect. Hezbollah formed while Israel still occupied southern Lebanon. Hezbollah formed as a resistance against that occupation.


Completely incorrect. Hezbollah's original aim was the resist the Israeli occupation of southern Lebanon.


Completely incorrect. Hezbollah remains the primary defence force for southern Lebanon.


Every activity you mentioned is performed by Israel. And far more than it is done by others in the region.


Really? Wow...


http://www.askoxford.com/concise_oed/army?view=uk


You're such a nice person, attempting to pretend that the thousand+ civilians killed by Israel were really Hezbollah militants. Does that include the women and children?

The fact is, like any resistance movement, they must hide their identities. Just like the French resistance in WW2.


Except that some are militants, and some are innocent civilians.


1. Should the French resistance have identified themselves in WW2?

2. Are the actions of the NAZIs the fault of the French resistance because the French resistance refused to identify themselves?


Idiotic fallacy: you assume this is based in the USA's liberal/right-wingnut dichotomy.


Read up on the history of Hezbollah.


Was the French resistance legitimate? Were they a legitimate target?


Once again, Israel admitted there was no Hezbollah presence at Qana. Yet they bombed that apartment building anyway.


Idiotic fallacy: Israel aimed at Hezbollah and accidentally hit a few civilians. Fact: the vast majority of Israel's victims were innocent civilians. Any hezbollah targets destroyed were mere accidents, nothing but collateral damage, during a campaign against civilians.


Israel crushed Hezbollah? You mean how Israel spent about US$2 billion and managed to kill 50 Hezbollah fighters, and a thousand civilians?


I notice your complete lack of support for those assertions.


The word is "legitimacy".


Incorrect, again. Hamas is considered a resistance organisation in many places. Heck, you should keep in mind that Israel itself is not recognised as a state by many nations, and is considered a terrorist organisation by many.

I was wondering if the person from "the right" can fill me in on how Israel was created, wasn't the Jews back then called terrorists by the West. Isn't it funny how it has turned full circle. But I understand that the Jews back then wanted a homeland of their own after the holocaust and regarded Jerusalem as their's. But when Israel was formed, many Palestinians died or quickly became unemployed and refugees living in poverty. Is that acceptable. It would be interesting to find out how many Palestinians died for the creation of Israel but does that mean the Jews were terrorists. I don't think so but it's interesting to realise there are 2 sides to every story.

The Jews suffered horrifically in WW2 due to Hitler cleverly mastering how to feed hate and ignorance in always blaming the Jews for every evil, some Arabs still do this today and it is completely unacceptable. But Israel does the same thing too. An Arab blows up an Israeli bus, kills 8 people, correctly is labelled an act of terrorism, but when an Israeli missle strike kills 8 civilians they just say they were targeting militants and that the civilians got in the way and they regretted the mistake. Yet this happens far too often and smells of hyprocrisy.

I do agree that Hezbollah are far from saints and their actions in abducting the 2 Israeli soldiers was stupid as it resulted in Lebanon being turned into a war zone (regardless of whether you agreed with Israel's response, they gave Israel a perceived justification for their actions).

There's nothing quite like an anti-semitist lunatic. They start off sounding reasonable, even knowledgable, but knock their statements apart with a few well placed facts and they lose any semblance of intelligence.

I'm only going to address those comments that you've managed to rebut with something other than "NO U!"

Um... probably because you do. You cheerlead for Hezbollah and Hamas (both undisputably terrorist because they both call for the complete destruction of a nation), ergo, you love terrorists.



Ludicrous. You've just lost what little credibility you retained.



This is just... so stupid on so many levels.

Lets start with the most obvious fallacy - if the campaign was against civilians, then why didn't Israel just carpet-bomb Lebanon, killing everyone, militant or civilian, that they could?

Furthermore, even if it WAS a campaign against civilians, it would have been stupid and incompetent of the IDF to fail to target military structure, thereby giving them a chance to fight back.

Those are just the two most obvious rebuttals of that completely insane statement you came up with... but feel free to try again.



You can nitpick all you want, but you're failing to address the fact that Hezbollah is taking a deliberate anti-civilian action in an attempt to milk their propaganda weapon for all its worth.

Furthermore, the French were defending an invading army. Hezbollah invaded a soverign nation. Completely different scenario.



Only in rogue nations like Iran and Syria is this even remotely true.

i really don't care who started it. that whole area needs to be nuked off the map