HOW do yoou take Hezbollah out???

I just heard on MSNBC that Israel in in for the long haul UNTIL they take Hezbollah out. How is this possible considering they are being financed by Syria & Iran for weapons...If they kill some or destroy their infrastructure, they will simply rebuild??

Bombs and bullets I assume.

2 more will arise to fight them until finally you run out of bombs and bullets because you were too stupid to try something else.

the Taliban & the Iraq insurgency? They are part of the gov't, even Lebanon is too weak to do anything. The US & Israel are starting to believe their own press. There are not enough bomb in the world......ALL this for LAND? I will never 'get it'. We have enough resources to live in peace around the world. The time is coming shortly that we won't....then WHAT?

Your comment is about as misguided as the recent Israeli aggression. You may think suggesting the Israeli's kill hundreds of thousands of Lebanese is cute, but it is disgusting and ignorant. You are about as much a "lefty" as Wolfowitz.

For every Hizbollah sympathizer Israel kills, there will in time be 5 more to take their place. Israel already tried AND FAILED at occupying a part of Lebanon. It will fail again.

lets live in the realm of reality for now.

I think there are 1.4 million Lebanese Shiites.

they are integrated throughout the country and region,

You don't "take them out."

It's possible to perhaps defuse themn by weakening their case. But bombing cities and killing civilians does just the opposite.

The Shi'ite minority in Lebanon seems to like them, but the Sunnis, Christians and Druze decidedly do not. As someone said here, Lebanon is a civil war disguised as a country.

Unfortunately, my answer is that looking back at the past few decades, the best answer was the middle stages of Israel's occupation: clear them out of the extreme south of the country (using the bombs and bullets method an earlier post mentioned) and then maintain that as an uninhabited buffer.

Unfortunately, even that may not work, since Hezbollah has shown it now has longer-ranged weapons than previously thought (some heads need to roll at Mossad for letting that fact slip through). If that's the case, then there may not be a buffer/containment solution. Since Hezbollah has declared itself an existential threat to Israel, Hezbollah has thus decided that the only three ways this can end are:
1. The destruction of Hezbollah
2. The destruction of Israel
3. A change in Hezbollah's attitude.

Let's work on a way to find #3.

In Lebanon's June 2005 elections, their candidates won 80% of the vote.

An excuse to attack Iran?

this is about Iran and the coming Iran bourse. JUST in time for the US elections.

http://www.iranian.ws/iran_news/publish/article_16543.shtml

"took out" the Viet Cong guerillas.

With just about the same "success" rate....

Just like they have scared the crap out of Americans in Iraq... Over time, this will turn out to be a major blunder on the part of the Israeli government. A group that was contained will become a group that will unite to create huge problems for the Israeli people, would be my concern.

Besides, the Israelis are a good deal more ruthless about things than the US is.

soldiers...So they know it can be done.

The I in IED is for improvised, and I doubt an IED will have the power to kill a tank. An Anti Tank mine or missile is designed for just that purpose and if properly used will.

Given the amount of munitions that could not be home grown, I suspect that the Hezbollah are using real AT stuff, unlike in Iraq where they do not have access to such things.

Remember, not all mines are IEDs.

If they were so great why didn't they solve the problem in Lebanon last time? Some problems don't have a military solution, unless one wants to commit Genocide. And the Israeli's, of all people, should know the consequences of going down that path.

Genocide is Genocide, whether done with gas chambers, bombs or forced starvation.

As a military force, they are one of the best and certainly well above anything else in the region. However, Gaza and elsewhere is asymmetric warfare, which is armor is ill suited for. Lebanon is a mixed case. Hezbollah has shown some advanced weapons and has played on Israeli fears about being bombarded. It also has mixed with the populace forcing the IDF to chose between stopping the attacks on their cities or harming civilians. Which choice the IDF would make as clear.

Have read several pieces today that claim that the Hezbollah attacks on Israel where a long time in the planning. Be interesting to see if that is indeed the case.

and they couldn't take Hezbollah out.

And at what price?

This strategy is an enormous risk for a questionalbe benefit.

The best laid schemes of mice and men often go awry.

government.

there is no solution in this way, just more war, hate and death.

and you co-opt their social support systems among the local populations.
You build far better schools than the madrass, and you provide secular systems
that actually help, free from the Padrone/Peon quid pro quo.

That is the social democratic way ( or the way back) from the prismatic to the diffracted society.
And by the way-- it's not just for the third world anymore.

Google Fred Riggs and his metaphor on the transition of societies into modernity.

drop the Love Bomb?

you sound like me on 9/12/01...

1. The west's new Marshall plan.

2. The Christian Thing To Do. Would Jesus do what Bush does?

3. Making the UN earn its keep.

4. There is more to foreign relations than buying their oil versus stealing it.

5. Stopping the theocrats over there, so we don't have to stop them here.

Some don't pan out, but it is cheaper than the military way, which is not actually a solution more than 4/5ths the time.
War is Politics by other means.
Global Capitalism is class warfare by other means.

Iraq is just an exercise in creative destruction in their Ayn Rand
mythology. There is a divide between the ones that deny the guts and gore
that they have wrapped the flag around, and the ones who think it makes the flag
better, more magickal.

Rummy got into trouble doing it on the cheap.
And cheap warfare is wrecking our economy.
We are one more ops theater from a draft and a command
economy.

This is a better way, I think than becoming New Sparta.
Because I, for one, don't want to be a Helot.

I love it,

Of course it is the only way out of this insanity.

with the iraq war money? how many tropical diseases could we have eliminated?

and it didn't even have to be in arabia - any muslim nation, hell, any third world nation would do. mousquito nets for all of subsaharan africa. how much is that? 100 million bucks? a trifle compared to iraq.

after 9/11, jesus would have turned the other cheek. we could show that we're good guys, that we can act out of altruism - because our ethics demand it. instead, the M.I.C. has us in its grip - the only solution to any conflict is more force.

yes, i watched Why We Fight last night.

Ya gotta love it :party:

Why We Fight, not Don't Look Back.

i dont know what is wrong with humanity. maybe we are mentally flawed and cannot survive peacefully.
this solution seems so obvious.

causing those in conflict with your interests to invest in a mutual interest, thus mitigating conflict.
It can also be seen as the triumph of the marketplace of ideas over sectarianism.

Further, it is the extension of human valued society and economic life into a culture
that is locked in an unhealthy duality between social life and doctrinal purity.

I think that only societies with good safety nets and social support systems are sustainable.
Everything else is a nightmare state, or a revolution 3 hungry, miserable days from now.

Didn't they invalidate Hezbollah's causus belli when they withdrew from Lebanon? Hezbollah's stated response was "We liberated Lebanon; now on to Jerusalem".

I'm with this board to the extent that it condemns Israel's overreaction, but seriously, it's astounding to me how unwilling a lot of people are to condemn Hezbollah's militancy and irredentism.

Or Hamas, for that matter.

Let me get this out on the record-- there are no saints in this series of interlocked conflicts.

But there is no logic in trying to punish the Lebanese for allowing hezbullah to be their benefactors.
First, they needed the social services from somewhere, and the party provides it.
Second, after the Druze and the Phelange were in turn decimated there was no Lebanese government strong enough to stop anyone and everyone from just rolling in. At first, IIRC, the Syrians were greeted as saviours. Theirs was a government like Turkey in the Ottoman empire. Now they are getting rolled over again. and as in so many of these evil situations, we were a part of this nightmare.

They are burned down, the teachers killed.

You coopt their social support situations, and you get harrassed. The population may like you, but doesn't turn to you.

There are many things you can do, but few of them have worked where the rot is sufficiently strong.

Because every week they hear how horrible the other side is, how wonderful they are, how they are wrongly oppressed, how if the truth be told they should be teaching the teachers, and how everything being done for them is an attempt to corrupt them. Even if a lot of people don't believe it, enough do. And most of the rest are afraid to contradict those that do believe it.

If you try to institute secular ideas, enough people consider it imposed from without; it's a dishonor, a humiliation, and in a honor-based culture with xenophobic overtones, you lose.

Don't rip up th toadstools. Kill the mycelium, and keep it from getting re-established. Some mycelium produces nice mushrooms. But as long as everybody says that the mycelium is sacred, a mycelium of peace and tolerance, you'll get toadstools. As long as everybody says there is only one kind of mycelium, you'll get toadstools. S. Lebanon is awash with toadstools.

because if you have a brain you can't dismiss them as only a terrorist organization. They provide and control much of the social infrastructure in southern Lebanon, meaning schools, hospitals, water, and food distribution.

Thinking one can destroy them is insanity.

an object lesson to some in the ME

- Destoy the Hezbullah organization including facitlities and killing the leadership
- Supporting the Lebanese government in regaining control of southern Lebanon
- Preventing the Syrians from interfering
- Leave the locals sufficeintly terrorized that they won't let it happen again.
IDF doing the basic shock and awe thing. They are quite blatant about it.

What they are not doing is intentionally targeting civilains, depites whinning to the contrary. What is happening is that they are using back plotting artillery radar to locate launching areas for rockets, leafting the populace to get out, and then targeting them.

Put that is place and they build up Lebanon on every aspeact and make it clear that Hezbullah has to be removed or sanctions will be placed. The econmy is was alive, this could have worked instead of brute force that has killed over 150 innocent lives..

It will fail. They are really undermining the Lebanese government and strengthening Hezbullah's hand. They did it before in the 1980's and now like madmen, they are repeating the mistake expecting a different outcome.

And THEY ARE INTENTIONALLY TARGETING CIVILIANS. They just define civilians as those they aren't targeting. They know a lot of civilians will get killed.

they would just drop a couple nukes on the country, or we would see much much higher casualty counts.

Get a clue.

I dont posses the massive academic brilliance of all the anti-israel people on this board. They are so smart infact they are posting on the website of a party that advocates israels stance and supports them. Who really needs to get a clue?

Collateral deaths are not the same as intentionally targeting Civilians. Considering the amount of ordinance reportedly used, I am surprised that there are so few casualties. For comparision look at London or Germany in WWII.

This AM I read several pieces pointing out how the IDF was leafleting prior to bombing areas that rockets were being launched from.

Finally, if the IDF was targeting civilians, the count would be in the 1000s.

Yes there are civilian deaths, but your position is little more than hyperbole.

They know when they drop heavy ordinance in a civilian area that civilians will die. They purposefully drop heavy ordinance in civilian areas. They can put a euphemism on it of "collateral damage", but it is the murder of innocent civilians.

The IDF does not sprinkle bombs around the countryside willy-nilly. You have to look at why they are attacking that area. If it was used as a launch site its justifiable militarily. Also by leafleting they are covering themselves in terms that they did try to eliminate civilian casualties. Yes there is a potential for civilian casualties, but that is not their primary concern.

Without intent, its not murder, though that does not make the deaths any more palatable. Both Hezbollah and Israel share culpability for them.

Hezbollah has been in control in the south for some time. They run that end of Lebanon, not the national government, UN resolutions not withstanding. However, unlike a number of the rag tag factions out there, Hezebollah has enjoyed significant support from Syria, Iran, and possibly other nations. They set up services and clearly have received major military support, again outside the purview of the national government. They have done all of this while still participating in the national government. A somewhat odd situation to most of us, but not all that far fetched in the ME.

targeted them "intentionally" or not. Dropping bombs into cities full of civilians is mass murder. Period.

and such hyperbole is adding nothing to reasoned discussion

Because they will become martyrs and more Hezbollah will pop up.

The only real way to solve this is by education. The Palestinians are mostly ignorant, illiterate and poor. . .so they believe what the Mullahs and intelligencia tell them.

I have copies of school books used by the Palestinians in schools. Not much information, alot of propaganda and alot of the "honor to martyr against the infidel."

Schools for Palestinians are indoctrination centers. . .hate Jews, hate Israel, hate America, hate the West.

Only when one gets past that and the victim mentality can Hamas and Hezbollah be truly taken out.

Hatred flourishes when people are relentlessly targeted for death and destruction whether they are educated or not. Hard to believe that educated Israelis don't hate Palestinians because of the assaults against them. The idea that people are willing to die for their cause of country is not an exclusive concept with just the enemy. Quote Nathan Hale: "I regret that I have but one life to give for my country". The tribal instinct survives whether the reward is seven virgins or a place in a god's heaven.

Most want the violence to end, but realize the Palestinians want to destroy Israel, not coexist.

would want the violence to end. Just makes sense doesn't it? To assume that every Palestinian wants to destroy Israel appears to be a broad assumption. I have read some statements by Israeli leaders such as Sharon who expressed the desire radicate Palestinians.

that was wrong and make themselves known.

When a suicide bomber kills civilians, there is dancing in the Palestinian streets and the rebuke on their side is very quiet.

The conflict has to heat up and result in such widespread horror (an order of magnitude more than mere 'terror') that there remains no constituency for conflict. (As long as the constituents for conflict don't have their own asses on the line, it'll take even longer.) The divisions and entrenched self-righteousness are far too long-lived to compare to any other historical precedent.

So, the question is whether history will repeat itself or "something new" succeeds. I'm betting on the former and hoping (not optimistically) for the latter. Judging from the rhetoric that even pervades DU, we're virtually guaranteed to go the "lots worse before it gets better" route - a route, just coincidentally, we're on ourselves.

The "best" that Israel can hope for is the temporary destruction of one piece of the forces arrayed against them with the inevitable result of it's resurrection in a more ferocious form. Which is, ironically, much the same result desired by Hamas and Hezbullah.

"You cannot have an empire like the Romans unless you do as the Romans do."

mechanism. I live in a Croat-American neighborhood, across the way on the next hill over are the Slavs and the Bosnian restaurant closed down.

These inescapable conflicts are not geographically based, but become the dark side of the national culture, even in a new land.
Or, as my Croat-American neighbor says-- it's as portable as a chicken in a neighborhood full of gypsies.

to people feeling powerless.

until the powers that be deal with mr and mrs palestinian six pak and give them both a state and access to services that are much, much better than what currently exists -- this will continue.

the west has dealt arrogantly and with impervious distance the plight and concerns of the palestinian people that we've grown this problem ourselves.

now here's the thing -- the fly in the ointment -- are our leaders so blind they couldn't see this or is there some other motivation?

are powerless.

They have political power; they have whatever economic power they can have, within their own society. They're left on their own ... and they must blame others. If they don't have a reason to call their own, they have to branch out to take on other's causes.

But the military buildup occurred for years before there was much of a problem. Even when things were looking fairly good, they decided to amass weapons. They don't listen to the calls of their own countrymen.

At some point, reality has to intrude.

all ways -- there would not be an hizbullah as we see it now.

as it is now -- hizbullah serves two purposes -- and armed force for the palestinians -- but not under palestinian control.

and as a control -- an armed one -- for the iranians.

you would take a lot away from both syria and iran if you dealt with the palestinians differntly.

but there would be some hurt israeli feelings -- so i don't think it will ever happen.

besides even the west gets rich off the hizbullah.

But here's a plan, not very realistic I admit:

1) Stop pouring oil to the flames.

2) Release the Lebanese prisoners in Israel and give up the Shebaa farms to remove the main reasons/pretexts for military activities against Israel and the raison d'etre for Hezbollah military wing.

3) Change the Lebanese constitution so that Shia plurality can have fair representation and the Shia are not blocked from top governement positions.

4) Let the power and responsibility (and corruptive effect) for governing a country do its moderating work.

nor eradicated for another will take their place. Only a full peace and a more meaningful justice can isolate Hezbollah and render them unpopular among the Palestinians.

you must first meet formally with Hezbollah's father, ensure him of your honorable intentions and request his permission

Don't forget the flowers and candy.

the OP was "take out," not "get lucky" . . .

;-)

more enemies. You must defeat an idea with better ideas. The idea of kill them all was attempted on the Jews in Germany, it did not work, neither will the asinine platitude of KILL THEM ALL.

thought I've heard in a long time...and its' Sunday!

to their country in exchange for the disarmament of Hezbollah after bilateral negotiations with the (pro-Western) government in Beirut.

That is the only way.

Call me silly, but I don't see OBL or Hezbollah as terrorists. They love their people and their faith...NOW. Saddam was a terrorist who only cared about his own wealth. NO ONE wants to ask the tough questions over WHY are they doing this..they may not like the answers. It's much easier to live in a fantasy world.

Somehow the truth must prevail.

Stranger, few want the truth. Have you read this..was posted on another thread.
http://www.commondreams.org/views06/0716-22.htm

????? :shrug:

Hezbollah was founded/started/organized after people in Lebanon were tired of the occupation and military attacks by Israel.

So how does Israel figure they can destroy/wipe out Hezballah? By destroying the entire population? :eyes:

educate and house the general population. I would provide quality medical care and raise the standard of living.

Share the world's wealth? WOW! I'd check my hard drive, the Feds are looking for you. We can't even embrace that idea in our country, how the hell are we going to in the rest of the world. US goes into 3rd world countries and rapes it of all its resources. WHEN you figure out how do do what you suggest and have the corpotocracy make money doing it, you'll win the Noble Peace Prize

Namaste

of stability, I don't know unless you can somehow make the Lebanese government more powerfully equipped and in control over Hezbollah.

You do it by helping the ordinary people with their problems, so they do not HAVE to rely on the "insurgent" elements of their society..

If you are homeless and hungry, you don't really care WHO feeds you or houses you..and after a while you identify with your benefactor, and will alert them to trouble, and will protect them if asked..
You REPLACE the "shifty" benefactor with a different benefactor..