Sheik Hassan Nasrallah is the leader of the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah. Although the United States considers Hezbollah a terrorist organization, three former U.S. diplomats had a chance to meet with Nasrallah this past February in Lebanon. The diplomats were members of a delegation organized by the Council for the National Interest.
During the meeting, Nasrallah discussed Hezbollah’s strategy to free Lebanese prisoners being held in Israel. He also spoke about the origins of Hezbollah, and recounted an event that is back in the news this week—Israel’s bombing of a UN observation post in the southern Lebanese town of Qana in 1996 which killed 106 Lebanese refugees.
JUAN GONZALEZ: And this issue of using Israeli, capturing Israeli soldiers to, in essence, trade for Lebanese prisoners is not unheard of, actually. Didn’t Nasrallah negotiate a major prisoner release back in 2004?
EDWARD PECK: Yes, and the Palestinians and the Israelis and the Lebanese, Hezbollah and Israelis have negotiated prisoner exchanges before. As I think you're aware, the Israelis have been holding a number of Lebanese as prisoners that they kidnapped from Lebanon, which is one of the contentious issues that upsets the folks on the northern side of that border.
4 comments:
I don't understand the point here, except that Isreal should never negotiate prisioner exchanges as that encourages these terror groups to capture more Isreali troops. Isreal is capturing people devoted to eradicating Isreal; the terror groups are capturing troops dedicating only to preserving Isreal. Nadir sympathizes with one side, Six and I with the other.
On one thing Nadir and I agree: establishing Isreal was a collasal mistake.
It amazes me how many of these stories present Isreal and the various anti-Isreal groups as having equivalent aims, when in fact Isreal aims not to conquer, incorporate, and subjugate any foriegn lands except to stamp out forces devoted to its extinguishment, whereas all these other groups have one aim: to extinguish Isreal and impose a retarded dictatorship on all inhabitants.
Remember, if Isreal throws all its arms into the ocean, it will get invaded and eradicated by these groups; if they throw their arms into the ocean, they will never see another Isreali troop, bullet, plane, or missle again for the rest of their lives.
Paul and I definitely disagree on Israel's aims. I believe Israel isn't just trying to secure its existence. I believe Israel is an imperial nation that would like to expand its borders to include Lebanon. Israelis have made incursions into Lebanon since 2000. This includes so-called civilian settlers as well who have used force of arms to take over olive orchards there.
You refuse to admit that Hezbollah was formed during the Israeli occupation of Lebanese territory which lasted for over 20 years. The current conflict was started when Hezbollah captured two soldiers to barter for Lebanese fighters who were captured in cross border raids.
I don't think this is a war of equals at all. Hezbollah is a resistance group that uses indefensible terrorist tactics to achieve its goals. Israel is a state that uses indefensible terrorist tactics to achieve its goals.
Israel is capable of killing many more Lebanese than Hezbollah will ever kill Israelis. Israel has much more fire power. Nothing equal about it at all.
Nadir: I certainly agree that Hezbollah manifested during Isreal's previous occupation. You canot find any assertion on my part to the contrary, so I don't know how you can conclude that I "refuse to admit" this which I consider to be a fact.
You see inequality here only in the respective military abilities of the contesting sides. Within a discussion of that inequality, your logic appears to require the stronger force to respond only within the limit of the weaker force, even when the weaker force is the agressor attempting to extinguish the stronger force, and when the stronger force isn't even attempting to conquer and rule the weaker force.
But that's not the inequality in which I am attempting to engage you in conversation. I'll discuss any inequality that you like, but I would like you to discuss the inequality in the goals of the respective sides.
You may imagine that Isreal wants to conquer Lebanon and make it the second Isreali state. But you cannot find any such goal documented by Isreal's government. Meanwhile, I am not merely imagining that Hezbollah aims to conquer the whole of Isreal and make it a part of a Muslim Empire within the borders established hundreds of years ago by Mohammad and his descendant rulers of said empire (including north Africa and southern Europe). Hezbollah's founding documents express this aim.
Isrealli settlers pushing into Lebanon proper and claiming for Isreal I oppose, though I can certainly understand why these settlers would think that they are providing a buffer against those in Lebanon devoted to Isreal's eradication.
You certainly must agree that Isreal's government would agree to an eternal cease-fire and stagnant borders, whereas Hezbollah will not.
And you have above repeated a claim (that Isreal invaded simply in response to the capturing of two troops) which you in other posts deny. Which is it? Isreal claims to have responded to X number of years of daily attacks on it by Hezbollah in Hezbollah's attempt to eradicate Isreal. What are you claiming?
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