Israel, Hizbollah, Lebanon and Iran
Shaken Israelis voiced anger and frustration at growing violence on Wednesday after Lebanese Hizbollah guerrillas seized two soldiers and killed up to seven.The attack has opened a second battle front for the Jewish state as it wages an offensive in the Gaza Strip to try to recover a captured soldier, plunging the region into the worst bloodshed since the height of a Palestinian uprising.
“The situation is tense and we are shaken. It is as if we are in mourning,” said Yehuda On, 52, who owns a food stand at the Mahane Yehuda market in Jerusalem.
“The army needs to react strongly,” he said.
The violence has knocked the hopes of many Israelis that it might one day be possible to break from conflict with various foes through a mixture of withdrawing from some occupied land and protecting boundaries with overwhelming force.
As one of the people, albeit not an Israeli, who shared the hope that Israeli withdrawal and strengthened borders would lead to an end to this conflict I am also dissappointed by recent events. A full out war in southern Lebanon is certainly not something I wish to see, although it is difficult to see how the Israeli government can avoid that sort of thing at this stage.
There was of course some hope that with the Cedar revolution in Labanon, Hizbollah would be forced into a more ‘normal’ political entity. While I still think that could happen, it hasn’t happened yet.
The elephant in the room here of course is Iran, a primary supporter of Hizbollah and almost certainly involved in, if not the prime instigator of, this attack. It is easy to see why Iran would desire increased tensions between Israel and its neighbors at this juncture.
