Triumph and tragedy in the Middle East

[Violet_Crumble]

Triumph or tragedy? Today's prisoners-and-bodies exchange across the front lines of Israel's last major war had elements of both. In Israel, the focus was on the tears of the two families coming to terms with the deaths of their soldier sons. But they were almost certainly killed in the Hizbullah raid across the border and the subsequent skirmishing which suddenly escalated into the July 2006 war. Their deaths had not been confirmed by the time Ehud Olmert launched the fateful bombing of the Beirut suburbs which led to Hizbullah's massive rocket salvoes on Israel's northern cities. But pictures of the wreckage of the Humvees in which they were driving suggested the occupants could hardly have got out with their lives.

Until this morning, their families continued to believe in miracles, prompted in part by officials on both sides who kept up a pretence they might be alive. Hizbullah knew the truth but refused to confirm their deaths, presumably fearing that in this macabre form of trading, the soldiers' exchange value would go down. While privately conceding that there was little hope Israeli officials also kept up the public myth that the men might not be dead. In their case the concern was that public anger over the 2006 war could be rekindled. After all, three Israeli soldiers had been killed by Hizbullah in a similar raid in October 2000 and Ehud Barak, the then prime minister, had not started a war.

In Israel ,emphasis was also being put yesterday on the grim record of Samir Kuntar, handed back to Lebanon today after his life sentence for murder was cut short. A Lebanese Druze, he was convicted in 1979 for the murder of a father and four-year-old child in a pointless raid on northern Israel, long before Hizbullah came into existence. So the narrative in Israel today was poignant and one of moral asymmetry: we give back a vicious child-killer in return for two brave soldier's remains.

In fact Israel handed back four other live prisoners, all Hizbullah fighters. Two had been abducted by Israeli commandoes from their hospital beds in eastern Lebanon. They also gave back around 200 bodies of Lebanese and Palestinian fighters killed at various times in the last several years, thrusting dozens of Arab families into the same grief as was being felt by the two Israeli families today.

So while there was mourning on both sides, only in Lebanon was there any real sense of triumph today. The Lebanese prime minister Fouad Siniora sought to make it a state occasion by going to Beirut airport to meet the Hizbullah fighters, but pundits in Israel as well as Lebanon see the swap as a victory mainly for Hizbullah. After all, it was not the Lebanese government which arranged it. Hizbullah did, through intermediaries. Inevitably it now claims the return of the four prisoners as Olmert's final humiliation and, in effect, an admission of defeat.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/jul/16/lebanon.israelandthepalestinians

[bemildred]

1. Cleaning up this mess was necessary.

But I would want to discuss it as little as possible.

[Violet_Crumble]

2. I really don't like the way it was cleaned up...

I've got no real issue with the release of the other prisoners, but Kuntar shouldn't have been released...

[bemildred]

3. Unless you are a big fan of Hezbollah, there is little to like.

I almost think it was done to distract from Olmert's on-going self-destruction. Nevertheless, if they would now sign Shaaba Farms over to Lebanon, we could have the pleasure of watching Nasrallah weasel and whine and make up reasons why he still needs to be a big-shot, like Olmert. And that would be amusing.

[pelsar]

4. do you really think the shaabba farms are relevant?

they werent an issue until Nasralla made them one after israel pulled out of lebanon...Hizballa needed something to fight for..and they're good at it. They made a non issue into an intl one (look how many people bought into that one). If israel gives the farms to lebanon he'll find something else to fight for. The Lebanese/Syrian/Turkish/British/Israel border has had many modifications over the last century.

why would iran/hizballa/Syria all of a sudden just "give up power and influence' they're acquiring on the expense of the Lebanese?

[bemildred]

11. What the hell difference does it make what I think about it? nt

[Violet_Crumble]

19. Yeah, I think there was a lot of political expediency involved...

Lot's of seeing it as closure for the Lebanon war in that 'get really mad in that direction over there, but don't get mad at me for dragging the country into the war in the first place!' sort of way...

[azurnoir]

5. Why was Kuntar released?

When so clearly he should not have been? Did the Israeli government really not have a clue as to the real fate of the soldiers as was being implied in the press?

from the article-

A Lebanese Druze, he was convicted in 1979 for the murder of a father and four-year-old child in a pointless raid on northern Israel, long before Hizbullah came into existence. So the narrative in Israel today was poignant and one of moral asymmetry: we give back a vicious child-killer in return for two brave soldier's remains.

moral asymmetry, perhaps I am cynical here but for the Israeli government was this more about creating positive PR for Israel and why?

The next few weeks or months should prove interesting.

[pelsar]

6. your knowledge of israel is so lacking....

it has not a damn thing to do with PR and everything to do with bringing our soldiers home......thats all it is.....our dead soldiers are simply worth more than him.....

[azurnoir]

7. So it is nothing like

Synagogues?

btw just for "fun"

one of the synagogues left was in the shape of the "star of david"... i dont think any israeli nor Palestinian believed that that building had any other "fate" then 100% destruction...

The whole "leave the synagogues because they are holy" was really no more than a PR trap set by israel. There was no way the Palestenians were going to "respect the buildings and leave them for some kind of memorial....we got some nice footage as they went up in flames set by the "mobs"

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=124&topic_id=217760&mesg_id=217760

[notfullofit]

9. I just don't get the

comparison between abandoned synagogues and the return of the dead soldiers?

[azurnoir]

12. nope I guess there is no comparison

the Synagogues did not make global headlines

[notfullofit]

13. "The fate of the soldiers is the glue that binds us"

snip

"By virtue of this power we decided to return the boys, even with the heavy price of releasing a despicable murderer," the prime minister said. "Nobody else will understand what every Israeli understands well: The concern over the fate of every one of our soldiers is the glue that binds us as a society, and it is this which allows us to survive in an region that is surrounded by enemies and terrorist organizations."

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1215330999233&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull

[azurnoir]

14. Read that one too

but the questions that if it was so important why did it take 2 years and almost 2,000 lives?

[azurnoir]

16. In addition

for the Israeli people you are most likely right in the reasons, but governments are a different story and IMHO no government not mine, not Israel's, not anyone's does a d*mned thing for completely altruistic reasons.

[pelsar]

18. i agree in that

in general all govts are "self interested' there is but one small difference with the israeli govts relationship to the IDF that probably few other govts have.....many of its elected members were part of the army, have kids and grandkids not just in the army but in combat units....on the ground (not in some office somewhere)

that puts a helluva lot of pressure on them during those family dinners......and all can see themselves in the shoes of the families of the kidnapped soldiers. Everytime the discussion came up, the question that had to be answered was: what if that was your son, father....would you want the state to leave them there? and that would include knesset members, those of the cabinet and even the security guards.

the return of those two soldiers was an extremely personal question to every one who voted, with intense pressure not just from the public but from their own family and own conscience.

[azurnoir]

21. Personal it may have been

but there was political pressure to not swap prisoners also, remember a couple of weeks back when some group in Israel wanted the Regev and Goldwasser declared dead to "lessen their value" as bargaining chips, a concept I found repulsive. However back to the point you can not tell me that the reported reactions of both the Palestinians and the Lebanese were not predictable and that those reactions would be seen as moral superiority on the part of Israeli's just as they are being reported. That moral superiority can go a long ways to offset the recent reports continued of settlement building in the West Bank, not to mention whatever happens in Gaza and with Lebanon both in 2006 and the future, so to claim that this did not play any part in the decision to release the prisoners especially Kuntar is almost ridiculous.

[pelsar]

22. the political out fall is yet to be decided....

i dont see an moral superiority here...i see hizballa played israel like a puppet on a string........

Hizballa, syrian iran increased their power in Lebanon, so they got what they wanted, not to mention the success of the type of operation. There will be more attempts just as there were in the past.....moral superiority has little play in geo politics.

personally i hope the mossad kills kuntar.soon...making it clear that israel is not to be trusted with deals using non state actors...and that non state actors themselves only bring upon destruction to their host state.

more so if im ever in that position...i prefer that that the Lebanese worms eat my body and help a tree grow, than make such deals.....

=====
on the lighter side of life, kuntar was just a kid, 16, when he entered an israeli jail, got married, divorced, studied etc....hes probably more israeli than lebanese druze right now...more so hizballa is Shiite muslim not really friends of the druze..there was some joking around here that he might have trouble fitting in.....

[Phx_Dem]

8. This article tries to explain the thought process

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?apage=1&cid=1215330996531&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull

[azurnoir]

10. Read that last night

also listened to Mark Regev who said some very similar things on NPR, I am not talking about the Israeli people but rather the Israeli government itself.

[pelsar]

15. the article is right..

those who arent israeli probably wont understand it.......we want to know that our sons, our dads will be brought home.....the wars will go on and its good to know that our buddies, our officers and the state wont leave us behind....

no matter how cruel hizballa, hamas and friends are.....

you dont get it, most wont...but thats ok, you dont have to.

[azurnoir]

17. See post #16

did not see this post until now.

[Violet_Crumble]

20. I get it, but I don't think it's all that unique...

What I think is the bringing them home thing does tend to overwhelm everything else, sometimes to the point of making little sense, as it has in this case. I don't think there's any feasible argument that can be put up that the return of two soldiers bodies was worth the release of Kuntar, given the horrendous crime he committed. I could agree with the logic of releasing the other prisoners, but not him, though I do think live prisoners for live prisoners and bodies for bodies is a fairer exchange. I don't like the habit of holding onto bodies because families need closure and no matter what facts are hitting them in the face that their family member is dead, they're going to hold onto hope until they can bury them...

Anyway, I don't think the bringing bodies home thing is all that unique to Israelis. Israel pays a much higher price to do so, but that's because the conflict is ongoing. With much older and long-finished conflicts like WWII, the urge to bring the bodies home or even to locate them and pay respects to their final resting place is really strong. HMAS Sydney was sunk by the Germans during WWII and everyone on board was lost, and years and goodness knows how many millions of dollars was spent on trying to locate the wreckage and when it was recently found, it wouldn't have surprised me if they'd tried to raise what was left of the ship and bring it all back home, but families mourned and everyone felt the sense of loss, even though it was so long ago and everyone knew right from the start they'd all died. I'm sure every country has this sort of thing and what makes it more acute is how recently it happened...

[pelsar]

23. the uniqueness is that its on going.....

its not just a matter of getting some bodies back from a war......its how we approach it for the next time. This is hardly the first time they tried..and no doubt it will be tried again and they may succeed again

whos kid, dad, brother, etc will be it?.....and how do we approach this next one? Hence the question, the pressures are very personal.

Israel spent millions looking for the Dakar an israeli submarine that went down on the way back from Germany and finally found it and brought back the conning tower, but they were dead and that was for closure, like the Sydney.