PM: Plan for Lebanon war made months in advance

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert told the Winograd Commission that his decision to respond to the abduction of soldiers with a broad military operation was made as early as March 2006, four months before last summer's Lebanon war broke out.

The commission, which is investigating the second Lebanon war, is expected to issue its interim report this month. It has sent testimony to attorneys representing individuals who could be harmed by its conclusions.

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Regarding the decision to broaden the ground operation toward the end of the war, Olmert said he had wanted to influence UN Security Council deliberations so that the draft resolution 1701, calling for a cease-fire, would be amended in Israel's favor.

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He said that as early as the first day of the war, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice spoke with Olmert and asked that Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Siniora not be undermined. Israel understood this to mean that Lebanese infrastructure should not be destroyed, even though the IDF had originally planned otherwise.

Haaretz

I thought this was heavily denied last year. Correct me if I'm wrong...

He did preserve the "if Hiz'bulah had not captured those soldiers" argument, sort of. I gather he had to explain all those meetings, and this is what he came up with.

The headline says "Plan" - not decision. Of course competent armies make plans for all contingencies that civilian leadership might call for. That's their job.

The decision to go to war. That's a different question.

Olmert testified before the Winograd Commission on February 1, and its questions focused on three basic issues: the circumstances surrounding Amir Peretz's appointment as defense minister; how and why the decision was made to go to war on July 12, several hours after reservists Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev were abducted by Hezbollah guerrillas on the northern border; and why Olmert decided to carry out a large-scale ground operation in Lebanon, 48 hours before the cease-fire, in which 33 soldiers were killed.

Added on edit: They did go over possible scenarios right after Olmert came to power and came to the conclusion that strategically if another cross-border abduction occured they would have to meet it with force or lose credibility. That is not the same as deciding at that time to start a war with Lebanon. Lebanon started the war when they abducted the soldiers. Israel decided ahead of time how they would respond to that contingency.

You have to watch bemildred pretty carefully. He seems determined to prove that Israel started the war with Lebanon last summer - despite zero evidence for that claim. Even Nasralah admits he started it. In fact this article proves that the actual final decision was made hours after the abduction and while rockets were landing in Israel.

I've seen a lot of headlines that didn't match the article perfectly because a reporter wrote the article and an editor wrote the headline.

I was going to reply differently but... you say, only if I didn't read the article, and then say, the headline says... ...but the article which I did read, said differently in short order so... I'm going to take a rain check on this one and not try to pit the article's components against each other without actually knowing better.

You obviously read it carefully.

Since this has happened before (people interpreting possibly ambiguous statements made by Israeli leaders in ways that show deception on their part if that can possibly be shown) I was a little gun shy. I suspect we are dealing with some idiosyncrasies of Hebrew / English translation. I also notice that pelsar's (English as 2nd language) statements are often misconstrued in a similar way by the same people here.

From this experience I'd say it is not useful to pick a particular word from a large article or statement in such a translation and attribute broad meaning to the article from that word - especially when it can be used to justify some ideological position that is held by either side.

It is better to read the whole article in context for a better understanding.

When I do that I believe the gist of the article is that:

a) When Olmert came into office he consulted with the military about many security issues.

b) They were concerned about possible cross border abductions of the IDF by Hisb'allah along the Lebanon border. He ordered the IDF at that time to do whatever was necessary to prevent such occurrences.

c) He also decided at that time (to avoid a future snap decision under pressure) that if such a cross border abduction did occur the military should probably respond with preset air and moderate ground forces - or they would lose deterrent credibility.

d) When it did occur he decided within a few hours to go forward with their predetermined plan for that eventuality.

e) That is not making a decision ahead of time to start a war with Hisb'allah.

Please accept my apology for jumping to the wrong conclusion about your reading of the article.

Without claiming that if e) was not true, that this is some sort of hallmark of evil - I do not believe that to be true - I see that as splitting hairs. The truth lies on both sides of the statement, neither with the statement as written. That's OK, but I feel it's worthy to explain what I mean here.

I mean that:

1) Either Olmert made a decision ahead of time to start a war with Hisb'allah no matter what Hisb'allah did, or

2) Olmert made a decision ahead of time that IF Hisb'allah captured Israeli soldiers, the conflict would be escalated to a war.

I see hypothesis 2) as the true one. 2) means that Olmert did not start the war.. per se. 2) means that Olmert preferred war to negotiations or limited strikes short of a conflict large enough that one could fairly call it limited war. 2) means that Olmert made a CONDITIONAL decision, which guaranteed war with Hisb'allah, IF Hisb'allah engaged in a hostile action which intelligence long predicted was likely to occur and was only a matter of time before occuring.

I do not find this to be evil or malicious but, I do find that this conditional decision, this hair trigger, if you will, makes the loud denials that Israel "planned" a war with Hisb'allah to be very shallow and hollow. Yes, militaries plan a lot, but very few plans are accepted as active contingencies, for example, the German invasion of France in WWI in the event of war with France's ally, Russia. That was no mere piece of paper, and neither was Israel's plan to invade S. Lebanon.

I am saying respectfully that it is a distinction without a difference; the decision to go to war was indeed made, with the timing left to Hisb'allah's own actions, with no serious person within the IDF believing that Hisb'allah would fail to trip the tripwire connected to the trigger to engage in a war that had already been pre-approved by the Prime Minister. That is why I view the contents of this article as being an admission of something that was strenuously denied, even though a play on words is being used to further deny that this is such an admission... but read closely enough and it's plain as day and night.

by the IDF over the years since 2000 with plans for various reactions to a successful kidnapping...its wasnt a secret as many units participated in those exercises......including reservists.

. . for your position.

However, despite all the philosophy and semantics being applied here the larger question of who started the war and who is morally culpable for the deaths of over a thousand innocent civilians is still easily answered.

If Hisb'allah had not crossed the border killing 8 IDF and capturing two others while simultaneously firing ball-bearing filled rockets into Israeli villages and IDF positions along the length of the border - there would have been no war last summer and all those civilians on both sides who died would not have.

I believe your logical error is in elevating Israel's plans for contingencies to a desire to have a war with Hisb'allah. I have no doubt Israel would prefer that her northern border remain peaceful. At the same time you demote Hisb'allah's intentions to cross the border to attack Israel as something they just couldn't help themselves from doing. You imply that Israel (and the world) should expect such actions from "those people" and not hold them to the standards of other civilized nations.

I guess I just like to apply such standards equally to all parties in a conflict - especially where the lives of innocent civilians are at stake. When those standards are applied fairly and impartially civilians in such situations in the future have a better chance of living through it.

PS - Thanks for engaging in a reasonable argument without personal attacks. It's a refreshing experience.

the "trip wire" you mentioned was the kidnapping. The previous 6 years of sniping, shelling, planting mines, attempted kidnappings made it clear that eventually the IDF would have to react...unless of course you believe that hizballa should be able to attack a country across the border at will and that country should not respond.....

hizballa just kept on jabbing until eventually they "got what they wanted"....the bad guys here are hizballa

My position is that no one forced Hezbollah to commit acts of aggression and no one forced Israel to destroy non-Hezbollah, Lebanese civilian infrastructure in retaliation. Both went in with their eyes open and with specific plans about what they wanted out of the conflict. That and... just because your enemy wants something does not obligate you to give it to him.

But anyway, I don't like being petty about blame. Especially nine months removed from the matter. I'm just amazed Olmert's said anything that even hints of pre-planning (in the vulgar sense that ordinary people would understand it to mean).

of the word "planned" - and that makes a big difference.

Most of those I've seen maintaining Israel "planned" the conflict mean that Israel intended the conflict. But what the article says is that there was a pre-planned response - but the "trigger" required Hizbullah to initiate hostilities. Or to put it another way - if the situation is such that it's inevitable that Hizbullah attack and kidnap Israeli soldiers, we effectively are already in a state of conflict.

Yet Israel shoots people from helicopters, razes houses and similar things all the time. Yet that isn't considered a provocation to war.

They have a very low tolerance for violence when it's against them and a very high one when they are the aggressor.
This is why this issue isn't going away. It's the old double standard thing and no one is buying it.

"shooting people from helicopters". By that point, we were already at war, even if the politicians don't want to call it that.

breakaleg has it firmly set in her mind that the Palestinians have no evil intentions against Israel - that they only want to establish their own state and live in peace.

But Israel won't let them you see. Every time things get peaceful Israel enters the territories and starts killing random civilians in large numbers and bulldozing homes - and that causes the Palestinians to lose faith in their peaceful leadership and demand hard liners instead who will defend them from Israeli aggression by sending Qassams and suicide bombers into Israeli villages and towns - since that's the only effective defense that they have left.

She knows that's true because after each flare up in the conflict more Palestinians die than Israelis - and numbers don't lie.

I'm afraid any other story just won't fly with her.

Don't you have a hate site that's calling your name?

Introductory Anti-Israel.

Shall we continue with the mutual insults?

Apparently Bush colluded with Israel on the Lebanon invasion months before the war began. So what does that make the USA and Israel? How about conspirators in an effort to kill many innocent Lebanese civilians who were caught in the middle of this military overkill?

Or it's the reason that a world poll puts Israel at the bottom of world respect, next to Iran, and with the USA only up another notch. The most highly DIS-respected countries in the world, Israel (lowest), Iran, USA in that order.

If this has been reported previously in this thread sorry about the duplication.

Watch this Seymour Hersh interview yourself and see Wolf Blitzer cut him off at the end.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_5eBrfrWoTk

My concern is Israel's demonstration of a hair trigger that resulted in the massive invasion of Lebanon. If it wasn't a hair trigger it was mapped out in advance in collusion with George Bush, as Mr. Seymour Hersh indicates in that interview.

The world should worry when any country with nuclear arms at its disposal, irrationally sets out on a path that they know will kill and displace thousands of civilians, all over a minor border incident that some claim Israel was the provocateur? Our reckless invasion of Iraq certainly should also send out some warnings about the USA.

http://www.mg.co.za/articlePage.aspx?articleid=280118&area=/insight/insight__international/

I'd like to see a nuclear free Middle East to minimize the threat that any country will turn the world's oil supply into radioactive waste.