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Pessimism has taken hold of Israel

Jonathan Steele

The war in Lebanon and rockets from Gaza have reinforced a great mood swing. People no longer seem to want a peace deal.

THE ISRAELI artillery fire that claimed 18 civilian lives in Beit Hanoun this week is the worst single attack in Gaza for six years. Whether it will prompt an end to Hamas' moratorium on suicide bombings hangs in the balance, but the attack — said by Israeli officials to be an error — has clearly put Israel on the moral defensive.

Even if the shells had been properly aimed, they would still reflect the same shockingly disproportionate response that Israel inflicted on Lebanon this summer after two soldiers were captured in a cross-border operation by Hizbollah guerrillas.

Three months after the 34-day war against their northern neighbour, Israelis are still debating what, if anything, it achieved.

Israel failed utterly to achieve the stated goal of its Prime Minister, Ehud Olmert: getting the soldiers back. Nor, in spite of relentless bombing and repeated incursions by Israeli troops, did Israel succeed in eliminating the threat from Hizbollah's short-range rockets, hundreds of which remain in south Lebanon.

The United Nations resolution that ended the war calls for Lebanon's Government to take control of the border regions, but — as most observers predicted — neither the Lebanese army nor the enlarged international force is willing to disarm Hizbollah. Indeed Hizbollah has emerged from the war not only with greater support among Arabs around the Middle East but also with new clout in Lebanon, where it is pressing the government for more cabinet seats.

It is a spectacular litany of failure for a confrontation about which analyst Ze'ev Schiff said: "Israeli civilians have not suffered such frontal attacks since Israel's war of independence in 1948."

Naturally, Israeli officials dispute this. While admitting to surprise at the sophistication of the rocket-launching platforms and communications technology in the underground bunkers that Hizbollah has built since Israel withdrew from its previous occupation, they say Israel has destroyed most of them in the border areas. Though not disarmed, Hizbollah will not be able to rebuild its infrastructure so near Israel again. Israel also says it has the names of at least 500 Hizbollah fighters who were killed, making a large dent in the militia's strength.

Shlomo Brom, who headed the Israeli armed forces' strategic planning department in the 1990s, argues that the main failure was political. "Olmert's stated goals in the first days of the war had nothing to do with the real goals," he says.

Mr. Brom believes the air force achieved considerable success in the first 10 days of the war by hitting most of Hizbollah's long-range rockets, doing enough damage to force Lebanon's government to confront Hizbollah politically, and showing that Israel's threats to strike hard were credible. The error was to launch a ground invasion with troops who were unprepared for determined guerrilla fighters.

The techniques used in the West Bank, where the army largely operates as a gendarmerie rather than a fighting force, were insufficient.

While the experts argue over how much was achieved, the public is in a state of shock and frustration. Anything less than victory is seen as a serious setback, and people blame the military as much as the politicians. Peace Now, the mainstream anti-occupation movement, broadly supported the war. Even Meretz, the small left-wing party in the Knesset, was split, with some members in support of the war, others silent, and only a few willing to denounce the war as soon as it began.

Gazans the losers

If the settlers were the main winners, Gazans were the main losers. While the Lebanese war was under way, the world ignored Gaza.

Israeli troops killed 300 people with scarcely a line in the media. This week's world outcry has at least put Gaza back in the headlines.

But for Palestinians to launch homemade rockets into southern Israel is pointless and counterproductive, serving only to strengthen Israelis' hard-line views. Looking back on the decades since Israel occupied the West Bank and Jerusalem, Mr. Segev adds: "In 1967 there was a choice: give the territories back and make peace, or settle them and make Israel strong. It hasn't worked. What a terrible waste of time the last 40 years have been." —

© Guardian Newspapers Limited 2006

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