Hypocrisy and the clamor against Hizbullah

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article14435.htm

Great read..

The claim being made against Hizbullah in Lebanon -- that it is “cowardly blending” with civilians, according to the UN’s Jan Egeland -- can, in truth, be made far more convincingly of the Israeli army. While there has been little convincing evidence that Hizbullah is firing its rocket from towns and villages in south Lebanon, or that its fighters are hiding there among civilians, it can be known beyond a shadow of a doubt that Israeli army camps and military installations are based in northern Israeli communities.

Hezbollah has proven to be a worthy adversary thus far. It would be niave to think they know nothing about the lay of the land and any military infrastructure so near their border.


------------------
If Hizbullah’s primary goal is to kill as many civilians as possible in Haifa, it seems to be going about it in a very strange manner indeed -- unless we are to believe that none of its rockets could be fired the extra 1km needed to hit central Haifa. Instead, as is clear from the view shown by BBC cameras, the port includes many sites far more “strategic” than the roads, bridges, milk factories and power stations Israel is destroying in Lebanon: it has the oil refinery, the naval docks and other installations that, yes, I cannot mention because of the censorship laws.

At the very least, we should concede to Hizbullah that it is not always targeting civilians, and very possibly is not mainly targeting civilians, which might in part explain the comparatively low Israeli civilian casualty figures.

-snip-

The second criticism made by HRW is that because Hizbullah’s rockets are rudimentary and lack sophisticated guidance systems they are as good as indiscriminate. That conclusion is wrong both logically and semantically. As I have tried to show, the rockets are mostly not indiscriminate (though presumably some misfire, as do Israeli missiles); rather, they are not precise.

its only an hours drive from nazerth....and he can even take some pictures of those same "northern israeli communities, including kiryat shmona....

but i guess that would kind of ruin the article....

and then of course if the missles can be aimed, why did he tell the israeli arabs of haifa to leave?.....or hes aiming at them, or perhaps hes wants to do some ethnic cleansing on his own?....

all in all, the article is simply aimed at those who know nothing of israeli geography and are gullible to boot....

he did piss off quite a few israeli arabs of haifa who have now requested to join the IDF (israeli hebrew paper maariv, thursdays edition)

where did that come from? They are spread through out israel, in fact usually away from the arab communities

Israel, Not Hizbullah, is Putting Civilians in Danger on Both Sides of the Border

Here are some interesting points raised this week by a leading commentator and published in a respected daily newspaper: "The Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert embeds his soldiers in Israeli communities, next to schools, beside hospitals, close to welfare centres, ensuring that any Israeli target is also a civilian target. This is the practice the UN's Jan Egeland had in mind when he lambasted Israel's 'cowardly blending ... among women and children'. It may be cowardly, but in the new warfare it also makes macabre sense. For this is a propaganda war as much as a shooting one, and in such a conflict to lose civilians on your own side represents a kind of victory."

http://www.counterpunch.org/cook08032006.html

I am a bit of a neophyte in the comings and goings of the disinformation that both sides disseminate into the internet, and debunking certain claims are very difficult to do.
For instance, to debunk this particular one you would have to overlay 2 maps: one of IDF installations, and the other of predominantly arab-israeli communities. This would give you a pretty clear idea concerning the veracity of this claim.
On the other hand, the sources cited in this article appear credible, and due to this I tend to consider the statements as true. I don't get the impression that the UN is as motivated to spread disinformation as the Israeli government is, due to need to impress the court of world opinion.
But I may be wrong.

I've read similar articles from different sources as well. I'd like to think that people would have an open enough mind to at least consider the possibility that what this article claims, is true.

Some distance from Nazareth, for example, Israel has built a large weapons factory virtually on top of an Arab town -- so close to it, in fact, that the factory's perimeter fence is only a few metres from the main building of the local junior school.

i noticed the author negelects to mention a single community....its quite legal to mention names of villages and towns in israel....