Dan,

Israel supported terrorist acts in Lebanon in May, 2006. In response, Lebanon collected evidence to bring to the UN. Hezbollah, in June of 2006, attacked an Israeli army post. In response, Israel bombed the living daylights out of Lebanon. Which side is more fair?

(Oh and don't you realize how you get a totally inaccurate percentage by using one side's number for the numerator and the other for the denomenator?)

Dan, you can be a cheerleader without being unreasonable. You started out the thread with a decently argued support of Israel, and now you've descended into anti-Lebanese propaganda. What happened?

Hezbollah just unleashed its full capabilities against Israel. So how much of a threat is Hezbollah? What's the likelihood that they will "wipe Israel off the map?" I think Israel was much more interested in punishing Lebanon than anything else, as Hezbollah posed no real threat. They are an easy target for Israel, a way to flex some muscle. It is not a new strategy.

- Daniel

[This message has been edited by Daniel Haar (edited August 19, 2006).]

Dan,

I think you're tilting at windmills here and attempting to put words in my mouth because it suits your rhetorical points or personal delusions, I'm not sure which.

I haven't been "gloating" over Hezbollah's "victory" or even praising it. All I've been doing is A). Ridiculing Bush for his claims that Israel has been victorious in this debacle, and B). observing that Hezbollah had much less grandiose stated objectives and apparently achieved them, so if we're going to count "victories," we might as well go for the fairly standard meaning of "achieving objectives."

As for the latest statistics you just came up with (without links, I might add), I have to say that "500" is a curiously even round number. Why "500"? Why not "492"? Why not "518"? Saying "500" sounds like someone just pulled a number out of their ass for propaganda purposes and quite honestly I'll look askance at any claim from Israel that someone was "a Hezbollah fighter." Why? Because as I observed higher up in this thread, any male in a certain range of ages who is killed always gets labeled an enemy fighter, despite the fact that without resorting to both a spirit medium <cite>and</cite> a mind reader, you're not going to find out who was what.

I give the benefit of the doubt to the corpse and lay the burden of proof on the person, or country, who did the killing. You say he was a terrorist? Fine. Let's see the evidence, and no, you're say-so is not enough.

And you call me a gadfly. Fine. Better that than a frivolous mau-mau.

Kevin, your say-so isn't enough, either. There's no basis for you to allocate the burden of proof when it comes to who gets to say what. If you actually have a reason to conclude, based on fact, that a lie is being spoken, then reveal it. But a general attitude of cynicism, based on your apparent scorn for one party or the other, does not permit you to get all uppity and snooty with those who do not share your cynicism and do not accept as fact that which you consider to be obvious based on your apparent predispositions.

It seems to me that Hezbollah has achieved a PR victory, since apparently it is a victory in the eyes of many merely to have fought Israel without being entirely and utterly vanquished, no matter how many of your leaders have been killed and no matter how much of your arsenal has been depleted. But such a definition of victory assumes that it was Israel's objective to exterminate every Muslim in southern Lebanon rather than to reduce the threat posed by a heavily armed Hezbollah militia across the border. The latter objective was largely achieved, however, with thoussands of Hezbollah rockets destroyed and the Lebanese army finally asserting some measure of control over the south. Had they done this before the fighting started, there would have been no war. Now the UN has called upon Hezbollah to disarm, and if that occurs, it is a huge Israeli victory. If it doesn't occur, then Israel will have the UN's help, in theory, to make it happen. It seems to me that Israel is being left in a much better position vis a vis Hezbollah than before. Which is the true measure of victory, as opposed to anti-Israel pseudo-joy that Hezbollah lobbed some rockets into Haifa just before its defeat.

Kevin--you don't write like you have a degree in anthropology.

Dick

First, for Roger: you've done a much better job, and I am now in rant mode. Kudos.

Janet,
I noted that the number of deaths had somehow declined in Lebanon. It points to the press chicanery well documented among both Hezbollah and, to a lesser extent, on the part of the Lebanese government. As in other endeavors, both these parties have been caught red-handed in efforts to manipulate international sympathies through inflation of figures and faking of incidents. The amazing part is that world opinion bought it.

Even more amazing, you’re disgusted to have it pointed out to you? Or are you in fact disgusted that 200 people are, in fact, alive and able to go about their lives, when previously you thought them dead? Do you actually want them dead?

Or are you disgusted because you’ve accepted lies for fact in support of a trendy sympathy? Or is it the larger lie of “indiscriminate” Israeli aggression, since the majority of this group were, in fact, Hezbollah fighters?

Daniel,
Okay, we’re allowed to use the “T” word for this exchange, I take it – to wit, “Terrorism”? I’m going to have to open this pandora’s box and say “why Daniel, which event are you referring to?” since you decline to elaborate, regarding the early summer chronology.

You’ve been gracious in the debate, so please take this at least a little collegially. The following tickled me just a bit, and I’ll explain why in a moment:

Here’s why: Up to this point I’ve had to explain to all and sundry how Israel’s war can not be judged unjust based on wailing, gnashing of teeth, and tearing of hair. It is universally recognized that in war, unfortunately, sometimes civilians are hit unintentionally. It is further recognized that this is likely to be an increased proportion in the case of a “guerrilla” war (a generous accounting of Hezbollah’s tactics, but accurate in that Hezbollah hides among the general populace.)

To the point: any numbers used in sympathy for the Lebanese civilian, have been derived as follows:
1. Take the total number of Lebanese killed in the war, reported by the government of Lebanon, to mean "all civilians," despite the simultaneous notion that they have no presence in the South;
2. Take the total number of Israelis killed, reported by the Israeli government, and broken down into civilians and military.
3. Compare these numbers.

Lebanon, you may notice, declined to cite the number of Hezbollah fighters included in this “civilian” total, thus making impossible use of numerator and denominator from a single source – a characteristic abdication of responsibility.

Again, up to this point, we have heard over and over again how “1,000 civilians” have died in this war, versus 150-odd Israelis, of whom X were civilians.

Here is the chronology of the methodology in use up to this point:
1) Siniora begins to release figures based on actual body counts
2) Siniora changes his mind, and bases his new figures on “bodies that must be under the rubble,” a few days into the war.
3) Siniora releases only numbers of “Lebanese civilians killed.” Sometimes the news media do something approaching their job, and say “mainly civilians,” rather than leave a question mark as to the proportions, which none of them did, preferring to just say “according to the Lebanese government.”
4) Siniora reports whatever “atrocity” is reported to him, inflating numbers at Qana, as well as the “one-man-massacre” incident, and repeatedly getting caught red-handed.
5) Israel begins to announce the number of Hezbollah fighters killed throughout the engagements. These are not cross-referenced to the “mainly civilian” claims by our so-impartial news media.
6) Israel, by contrast to Lebanon, releases the number of both soldiers and civilians killed. No fuss, no muss.

When the dust clears, Israel – which is straightforward throughout the engagements – announces its estimate of 500 Hezbollah killed. Lebanon does not in any way gainsay this assessment. Hezbollah itself is just plain laughable, moving around the same bereaved matronly woman to grieve the loss of home after home in news footage, and having the same guy “digging through the rubble,” and starring in the same photo shoot as a “corpse”.

The news media gobble up Hezbollywood images. Reuters runs a photoshopped image (amateurishly done I might add) which adds smoke to the fire, quite literally; U.S. News and World Report runs a cover of a Hezbollah member standing in front of a “downed Israeli aircraft,” which shows no wreckage, only a great big fire, which – if you zoom in close or use a loupe – turns out to have hundreds of tires in it; the list goes on.

And which numbers are untrustworthy? Why, Israel’s, of course!!!

Daniel, I am not against Lebanon, or the people of Lebanon… In fact, I think a strong Lebanese central government not controlled by Iran and/or Syria would be the dream scenario for Israel. I think the Lebanese government is still doing as they're told vis a vis Hezbollah. The proof is in how both are working already to undermind the cease-fire. This is dangerous for Lebanon - please understand what I mean by this. For Lebanon to be subsumed into a Syrian/Iranian orbit virtually guarantees continued provocations on behalf of Lebanon against Israel. You know as well as I where this will lead.

If you read what I write as anti-Lebanese, please understand that it is a GOOD thing in my mind that fewer civilians have died there, than were claimed.

What you may see as propaganda here, is my concern at Lebanon’s chumminess with Hezbollah from the outset of this cease-fire. Lebanon will not look for Hezbollah weapons, as long as they don’t carry them in the open; Lebanon will not look for Hezbollah tunnels; Lebanon will take no great pains to expel Hezbollah, allowing them instead to melt into the populace. Oh by the way, that International force, led by France? Changed their minds – big surprise there!

This does not bode well for the future, for either Israel or Lebanon. I personally don’t think it’s fair to Lebanon, to expect her to face down her Iranian and Syrian proxy on her own. But I doubt it’s an option for Lebanon to enlist Israeli aid in an independence effort, and ironically, Israel is the only other country in the region who would put boots on the ground to get rid of the Iranian/Syrian proxy force.

It turns out you cannot shake Syria by having a couple of rallies. If anything, this last month has shown us that.
Do you really think Israel is interested in “punishing” Lebanon? I do not. I think Israel’s goal has been consistent: to remove the influence of Hezbollah. It is not an unreasonable goal, as Hezbollah affects Israeli security. That makes Israeli security dependent on Lebanese sovereignty.

Of all the factions, of all the forces, of all the occupiers and foreign insurgents Lebanon has hosted over the last 3 decades, Israel stands out as the only one interested in a sovereign, united Lebanon. Think about that.

I understand your read, but disagree. Hezbollah makes no bones about its ultimate objective, and neither do Iran or Syria. Hamas prattles about Israel’s destruction as well, endlessly. And the international media are busy trumpeting the victory of any and all of these parties when they manage to get their own countries bombarded.

How much encouragement do these guys need? How long before Hezbollah acquires WMD from Syria (which has used chemical weapons on its own people,) Iran (which is fighting for its rights to nukes as we speak, oh, and by the way, is the most recent champion of the “destroy Israel” agenda among nation states,) or some other radical Arab or Muslim regiime?

And how much do we add to this calculus, by treating groups like Hezbollah as blameless, treating Israel as the aggressor, and treating clear and present terrorist attacks as if they do not merit responses? Oh and by the way, we are also supposed to believe that the terrorists have “achieved their objectives” and have scored a “victory” -- even while not believing they’ve achieved anything?

It’s one or the other.


Kevin,

observing that Hezbollah had much less grandiose stated objectives and apparently achieved them, so if we're going to count "victories," we might as well go for the fairly standard meaning of "achieving objectives."[/quote]

As alluded to above: do you believe that Israel has been destroyed? Is every Jew in the region murdered? No? Then Hezbollah has not achieved a victory. But it is, of course, a very stupid subject. As Krauthammer put it, it’s a tie. And in this kind of war, tie goes to the terrorist.

As you see above, Kevin, you would be taking the word of proven liars, if even Hezbollah or Lebanon had gainsaid the Israeli estimate.

500 “sounds like” it’s wrong? Yah. You know what “sounds like” it’s wrong to me? People who change their estimates for convenience the next morning, as in the case of Siniora on a number of occasions.

You give the benefit of the doubt to the corpse? That’s appropriate. Lots of the corpses counted by earlier Lebanese estimates are evidently walking around, and would probably be happy to explain their own deaths to you in vivid detail. And given the dynamics of this war and the American left anti-Israel faction, you would probably believe them. Some of the corpses in Hezbollah footage and photos, accordingly, turn out not to be dead at all, but busy looking for other corpses. It’s like War of the Living Dead, to listen to Hezbollah.

I know the truth is irritating to you, given your reliance on a subjective “feeling” that Israel “must be” to blame for all manner of ills. But taking the Lebanese count of actual “civilian deaths” seriously for over a month – when that number has been proven to be a propaganda tool on the part of the Lebanese authorities -- and then questioning Israeli numbers a priori the moment they come out, despite the absence of any such shenanigans on the part of the Israeli stat-gatherers, is a hypocrisy of such mammoth proportions that it cannot be taken seriously.

Again, in war, people die, and not all those people are bad guys. I personally think it is a good thing when a casualty count is lower, and when a greater proportion are actually combatants than non-combatants.

Janet expresses disgust at this, but I am happy that fewer rather than more civilians were killed in this war than we have been led to believe.

For my part, I am disgusted that such a hue and cry goes out in support of known liars, and known lies, as regards the Hezbollah and Lebanese Government counts of casualties.

I think I know where the benefit of the doubt goes around here. I get it, guys.

Just don’t fool yourself that people won’t call you on your B.S. It’s too transparent for that.

Dan

Rejoice, Janet! The over-1000 number is back, as of this morning!

From CNN:

This in a story about an Israeli operation in which no Lebanese were lost, at least for now. It depends if the count drops too low next week, I'm sure.

Dan

Dan,

There is no hypocrisy in finding sources more or less credible based on what it is they're reporting and who it is they are. Civilian authorities reporting numbers of their own civilians killed? I believe them. Lebanon reports numbers of its citizens dead? I believe them. Israel reports numbers of its citizens dead? I believe them. Anyone reports that initial estimates were incorrect and the new count is now some other number? Fine, I'll take that number and assume the discrepancy is based on the trouble of recovering bodies and you don't get an accurate count until you start tallying things up at the morgue, and in the case of collapsed buildings, that can take weeks, if ever.

"Is that a corpse?" is a fairly easy question. If it's someone only playing dead, they'll figure it out once they get to the autopsy, if not before.

In the case of military and or police reports, I reserve the right to extreme cynicism. It has been shown time and again--recently with American forces in the Iraq war--that the military finds it useful to declare that any male over a certain age that they kill is an enemy fighter because soldiers, if they're told that they've killed civilians, lose morale and fail to do the boo-ya happy-happy dance their superiors want so much. Or to put it another way, military and police have a longer history and more reason for lying.

"What were the political affiliations, goals and actions of that corpse?" is also a much more difficult question. And circumstantial evidence can and has been faked.

Finally, I think it more credible when either side gives their own body counts and reports of what percentage of those were their own soldiers. In the case of guerilla fighters like Hezbollah, that's a bit more difficult, but it's still no reason to take the oppossing side's military's estimate as granted.

Dan,

I thought people knew about this incident: car bombing in Sidon .

- Daniel

Soooooo the people I want to count "under the rubble," count, because they may be dead, even though I have routinely inflated figures in the past?

I am in awe of your critical faculties, Kevin. You never fail to amaze me in the fields of imagination and originality. The difficulty is that the morgue can't count people you just "hope" are dead, any more than people can interview the corpse.

What has been evident in the last four weeks is the utter absence of any semblance of concern for the truth in Lebanon's reporting of these figures. Or, to be generous, the subordination of the truth to the goals of the reporting individual.

You make a strange military/police versus civilian reporting distinction, as if civilians (with no ties to any "side,") were the reporting agency in Lebanon.

Not so. Government sources are the counters there as well, and Siniora is the country's leader, with military power in that country. The new "over 1000" figure quoted above is from "internal Lebanese security forces." Actually that is likely as not a synonym for "Hezbollah," but why pick nits. Your point, evidently, is that Israel's government constitutes police or military, and Lebanon's government constitutes civilians.

So let's see... Hezbollah has scored a victory because no actual Hezbollah fighters were killed, we can take them at their word... Israel is massively striking civilians, because Hezbollah and the Lebanese government say so, we can take them at their word despite proof of the desperate propaganda tactics of both, and Israel releases its figures, which are to be treated with extreme skepticism, despite the fact that they of all the parties follow your prescribed methodology in reporting their own losses.

A for effort, as always, Kevin. The execution, again, continues to be far, far off the mark, caused by a false dichotomy at the outset of the argument. Again.

Does this repeating occurence, in conjunction with your impassioned pleas in favor of subjective bias, strike you as constituting a pattern?

I'll sum up: The Lebanese government releases figures. The Israeli government releases figures. The Lebanese studiedly refuse to estimate the number of combatants in their figures, calling them all civilians (including, of course, the heavily armed "civilian" combatants Lebanon insists it is, as a nation, military incapable of facing.) Israel releases the numbers of both its military and civilian casualties. You claim the methodology of one party counting both its own dead civilians and soldiers is the more honest methodology. Your conclusion?

Israel cannot be trusted.

Boo-ya indeed.

Dan

Ah, you mean this
http://abcnews.go.com/International/...2007547&page=1
incident....the one in which Mahmoud Majzoub, a leader of Palestinian Islamic Jihad - which is an Iran-backed militant group that persisted in attacking Israel while other major factions adhered to a cease-fire was killed? The one in which his brother, Nidal Majzoub , who was also a member of the group, which has continued to launch attacks on Israel since a February 2005 truce that even the main militant group Hamas has respected was also killed?

The incident that Israel has repeatedly denied having anything to do with? (Both the allegation and the denial are found in the official UN report for Jan-July 2006 - with no conclusions being drawn by UNIFIL)

http://daccessdds.un.org/doc/UNDOC/G...df?OpenElement

While it is true that Palestinians have frequently blamed the assassinations of several militant leaders on Israel it is also true that some of the killings of leading members of Palestinian groups have been the result of intra-Palestinian feuds.

Islamic Jihad (and let us not forget that the Majzoub brothers were leaders of Islamic Jihad as well as Lebanese citizens and were living and presumably operating in Lebanon when they were killed by whomever killed them) is a virulent Anti-Israel group which is backed by Iran and Syria and which has claimed responsibility for an attack that killed 11 and wounded dozens in April in Tel Aviv, the deadliest Palestinian attack in 20 months. It is led by Ramadan Shallah, a Palestinian from Gaza who now lives in exile in Syria. It considers the 1979 Iranian Revolution to be the beginning of a new era for the Muslim world and wants to turn all of Israel, the West Bank and Gaza into an Islamic state. It rejects all compromise with Israel.

Let's see, April - Tel Aviv - that would come before May - Lebanon wouldn't it?




[This message has been edited by Lo (edited August 19, 2006).]