Wikileaks: Israel Plans Total War on Lebanon, Gaza
Juan Cole's Blog: Posted on 01/02/2011 by Juan
The Norwegian newspaper Aftenposten has summarized an Israeli military
briefing by Israeli Chief of Staff Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi of a US congressional
delegation a little over a year ago and concludes that
' The memo on the talks between Ashkenazi and [Congressman Ike] Skelton,
as well as numerous other documents from the same period of time, to which
Aftenposten has gained access, leave a clear message: The Israeli military
is forging ahead at full speed with preparations for a new war in the Middle
East.
The paper says that US cables quote Ashkenazi telling the US congressmen,
"I'm
preparing the Israeli army for a major war, since it is easier to scale down
to a smaller operation than to do the opposite."
The general's plans are driven by fear of growing stockpiles of rockets in
Hamas-controlled Gaza and in Hizbullah-controlled Southern Lebanon, the
likely theaters of the planned major new war. Ashkenazi does not seem
capable of considering that, given a number of Israeli invasions and
occupations of those regions, the rockets may be primarily defensive.
Ashkenazi told the visiting delegation that Israeli unmanned drones had had
great success in identifying rocket emplacements in southern Lebanon, and
that it had been aided in this endeavor by the US National Security
Agency,which spies on communications.
The new, major war will be a total war on civilians, Ashkenazi boasted: "In
the next war Israel cannot accept any restrictions on warfare in urban
areas." (I den neste krigen kan Israel ikke godta noen restriksjoner på
krigføring i byområder in Norwegian, or let us just translate it into the
original German: In den nächsten Krieg, den Israel kann keine Beschränkungen
Kriegsführung in städtischen Gebieten.) Mind you, the civilian deaths
deriving from this massive and unrestricted bombing campaign on targets in
the midst of civilian urban populations will be "unintentional." Planning to
bomb civilian areas with foreknowledge that you will thereby kill large
numbers of civilians is a war crime.
Ashkenazi also admitted to then Rep. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) that Hamas is
not in control of even more radical groups, which had infiltrated cells into
Hamas itself, and which had rocket-making capabilities. In public, Israeli
officials routinely demonize Hamas for every rocket fired from the lawless,
besieged territory of Gaza, but here in private Ashkenazi was admitting the
opposite. He even admitted that Israeli intelligence had no means to
distinguish the even-more-radical from the merely Hamas.
Other State Department documents on the same theme say that last year this
time Hizbullah had about 20,000 rockets, some of which can now reach Tel
Aviv, and that the Shiite militia will attempt to stretch out its supplies
for a two-month-long war, and would try to lob about 100 rockets at Tel Aviv
per day.
In the 2006 Israeli war on Lebanon, one fourth of the Israeli population was
be forced to move house. It will be more this time, and for longer.
The memos reveal that none of the goals of Israel's 2006 war on Lebanon and
its 2008-9 war on little Gaza were achieved, and that both Hamas and
Hizbullah have effectively re-armed. What makes Ashkenazi think things would
be different this time? Israel hawks have doomed themselves to the
particular hell of Sisyphus, forced to roll the same stone up the hill over
and over again with no hope of ever balancing it on the summit.
You know, Israel could have a peace treaty with Syria and Lebanon tomorrow
by giving back the Golan Heights and the Shebaa Farms, and by accepting a
two-state solution. Instead, its Dr. Strangeloves are planning out massive
bombings of areas thick with innocent civilians and willing to subject Tel
Aviv to two months worth of rocket fire.
Nor will the United States be held harmless from the blowback in the region
caused by another Israeli war of aggression. Before September 11, Israel
hawks used to make fun of Americans who warned that eventually there would
be hell to pay for the Israeli strangulation of the Palestinians (for the
argument, see this posting). And, imagine what a war would do to gasoline
prices and to the world economy. My deepest fear is that US support for
Israeli militarism, and the terrorism that support inevitably engenders,
will be what finally finishes off the civil liberties enshrined in the
American Constitution.
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