Cogito Ergo Non Serviam
Israel Decapitates Hezbollah
Over the week-end, the Israeli Air Force dropped some serious ordnance on Beirut where Hezbollah had a top level meeting going on. Among the dead is Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of the group. There were other casualties that will affect the leadership of the terrorist group. In terms of intelligence, this was a grand coup. Tactically, this was a major success. Strategically, it is difficult to determine what, if any, good will come of this. A power vacuum exists at the top of Hezbollah, and communications within the group are problematic. It is likely that some of Hezbollah will lash out at Israel, and it will be hard to control because it will be hard to determine who is leading the fight. It has turned up the heat in the region, and the future is going to be violent.
Hassan Nasrallah was a bad guy, no doubt about it. He was the mastermind of the Beirut bombing of the US Marine barracks back in the 1980s, and he has continue to kill people for the last four decades. He will not be missed. He contributed nothing. He failed at his life-long purpose. Sadly, he will have successors.
Odeh Bisharat, writing for Haaretz, stated:
Israel relates to its Arab enemies as if they were a pack of wolves: If you take out the alpha male, the pack disperses.
I don't know the source of its obsession with killing the leaders of its enemies -- the Palestinians, the Lebanese and even the Iranians -- but the approach is wrong: Leaders are an important asset not only for their public, but also for the enemy.
When the parties eventually reach agreements, there needs to be someone from the other side to sign them: a leader whose public will support them if they turn the steering wheel 180 degrees, from confrontation to conciliation.
He went on to point out that only Yasser Arafat had the standing among the Palestinian people to be able to sign the Oslo Accords. It is reasonable to think, he argues cogently, that Mr. Nasrallah was the only leader in Hezbollah who had the ability to make peace, or at least suspend the killing, with Israel. Now, with whom could Israel make a deal?
Names do not matter. The successor cannot make a deal for a long time. Whoever takes up the mantle of Hezbollah leadership must spend months if not years trying to give Israel a bloody nose before the followers of the organization will be willing to listen to peace overtures. If the newcomers offers an olive branch now or in the near future, said newcomer will be removed from office, and possibly killed, for betraying the cause.
The next few days will be a time for Hezbollah and its Iranian paymasters to determine what their response will be. Iran will try pumping the brakes because it really does not want a direct confrontation with Israel. Hezbollah does not care. Hezbollah wants vengeance. One could well see Israel move in on the ground in an effort to push back the artillery and missile batteries from the border, but a genuine occupation is unlikely while the Netanyahu government is engaged in the fight in Gaza. The truth is that Israel needs to call up more troops if it wants to fight in Lebanon while continuing operations in Gaza.
The anniversary of the October 7 attack is a week from today. Peace is as far removed from the equation as it was on that day. Killing Mr. Nasrallah merely insures that instability spreads in Lebanon, and therefore, the threat of even greater war continues unabated. But Mr. Netanyahu gets to remain as PM and out of the courts. As Malcolm Nance would say, "coincidence takes a lot of planning."
© Copyright 2024 by The Kensington Review, Jeff Myhre, PhD, Editor. No part of this publication may be reproduced without written consent. Produced using Ubuntu Linux.
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