Note: The translations of articles from the Hebrew press
are prepared by the Government Press Office
as a service to foreign journalists in Israel.
They express the views of the authors.
This Is What a Unilateral Withdrawal Looks Like
(Commentary by Alex Fishman, "Yediot Ahronot", June 2, 1999, p.3)
Anyone who has tried to imagine how a unilateral withdrawal from Lebanon
would look, got the precise and embarrassing picture from Jezzine
yesterday: SLA forces withdrawing and getting fired on. That is how a
withdrawal looks when behind it there is no agreement, no understanding
and no minimal deterrence from the IDF.
It was no accident that last night, under pressure from the army, a
meeting of the security cabinet was convened. The withdrawal from Jezzine
has become a critical milestone from the standpoint of Israel's deterrent
capability. The IDF believes that if Israel does not respond with suitable
force to Hizballah's crude provocation of the the withdrawing SLA, it will
pay a heavy price for this in the wearing away of its joint resolve with
the SLA in the security zone.
From the moment the SLA pull-back from Jezzine began, two nights ago, all
of the learned assessments of the Israeli experts on Lebanon collapsed.
These same experts promised that the Lebanese government has an interest
is in maintaining a quiet evacuation, so as not to provide Israel with a
pretext for continuing to hold onto southern Lebanon. In reality, the
complete opposite was true. Hizballah is receiving a strategic "umbrella"
from Syria, enabling it to shoot at the heels of the SLA forces under
Israel's nose.
Unlike Israel, Jezzine's notables foresaw the coming future. They did not
make a pilgrimage to the Lebanese president in order to ask for his
protection and good graces. They hurried to the door of Hizballah
Secretary General Sheikh Nasrallah and declared their loyalty. They well
know that in southern Lebanon the tail wags the dog, and not the other way
around.
In the meantime, the stormy events surrounding the Jezzine withdrawal have
created a launching point for escalation. Hizballah caught Israel in a
problematic political situation of an interim government. The IDF is
seeking instructions and approval from an interim cabinet and, at the same
time, is sending updates to the prime minister-elect, who has yet to take
office. However, IDF commanders yesterday warned that the political
interim period in Israel will not last long for Hizballah.
Military sources assess that Hizballah will continue to act against the
SLA in the coming days, until the pull- back from the enclave is
completed. Northern Command was preparing itself yesterday for the
possibility of another escalation and allotted forces in order to assist
the SLA in withdrawing from Jezzine in an orderly fashion.