Why Israel’s war went wrong


Israeli writer igal sarna says war in Lebanon has transformed the opinions of his countrymen


Last Saturday, with the impending ceasefire already in the air, I drove along Israel's northern border to the village of Zar'it. It was here, on July 12, that two Israeli soldiers where kidnapped, starting "the second Lebanon war", as it's now called, that has left more than 1,300 people dead, most of them Lebanese.

A woman who lives in Zar'it told me how her husband was ambushed in the very same place on June 6, 1969. It's a little valley where it's difficult to see far and easy to set a trap. She said the Israeli army knew exactly how dangerous the spot was but had done little to prevent a further ambush.

The fact is, little was done to prevent this summer's war, if anything. Two armies came face to face, spoiling for a fight - a Shia militia, well armed by Iran, and the great Israeli army, well equipped by the US. Neither could



A month ago, I wrote: ‘This is the most senseless war we have ever had’. A thousand readers cursed me

be restrained by their weak governments - the helpless Lebanese government on the one hand, and a beginner Israeli one, only recently elected, on the other. Both Hezbollah and the IDF (Israeli Defence Forces) had opposite interests from their civilian populations, who wanted a quiet border and economic prosperity after long-lasting wars. "When everything is over," said the woman from Zar'it, "we will punish the generals who were in charge."

A month ago, in the first week of the war, when it had the overwhelming support of the Israeli public, I wrote in Yediot Aharonoth, Israel's largest daily paper, that "this could be the most senseless war we have ever got involved in. All that is happening could have been predicted and could have been taken care of - if there was an experienced Israeli political echelon and a restricting American influence."

About 1,300 readers cursed me, using Ynet, the newspaper's online edition, to call me an idiot or a traitor.

But by the time of the ceasefire the Israeli mood had changed radically. With the rising number of army casualties, the public had grown sober.

Deaths of Israeli soldiers exert an even stronger moral influence than civilian casualties, because in Israel soldiers are considered to be "the children of everybody". Furthermore, military casualties are a sign that the system isn't working. Because this war was more transparent to the Israeli media than any war before, defective military actions were exposed. The reputation of the army, it transpired, was much higher than its operational capacity.

What went wrong? Part of the answer is to be found in our huge victory in 1967, when Israel managed, in a six-day blitzkrieg, to capture territories three times bigger than its own. The seeds of the next defeat can often be found in military victory.

Since 1967, the IDF has trained its fighters against Palestinians in the occupied territories. It has been a fight of the strong against the weak, which reached its destructive climax during the days of the



Deaths of Israeli soldiers exert a strong moral influence as they are considered to be everybody’s children

second intifada, when Apache helicopters were used against Palestinian vans and special operations units against refugee camp children.

Since then, a once-powerful army has been reduced to managing road-blocks and acting as security guards, rather than training for the next big war.

The IDF went into Lebanon in the past fortnight not expecting to meet bloody resistance from a determined enemy, sophisticated and well-equipped with long and short range missiles, an enemy that fires back and hits cities, tanks and helicopters.

And that's why the Israel of mid-August is a sober, hurt and scared nation, completely different from the Israel of mid-July.

Some say this mood will lead to political moderation, maybe even to an all-inclusive treaty. But bitter experience says that painful failure is often followed by a new military effort to erase the trauma, bringing with it further tragedy.