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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: LindyBill who wrote (24901)	4/13/2002 12:52:22 AM
From: LindyBill	Respond to of 281500

I posted on this Lebanon problem yesterday By Charles Krauthammer Wednesday, April 10, 2002 Watch Lebanon. If you want to know where the Israeli-Palestinian war is going, watch Lebanon. If the war goes -- literally -- ballistic, the fuse will have been lit by the Iran-backed Hezbollah guerrillas now firing rockets into Israel from Lebanon. But did Israel not withdraw from Lebanon almost two years ago? Why is there still a problem with Lebanon? Indeed, Israel had been in Lebanon for about 20 years. It was a classic defensive occupation. Israel laid claim to not an inch of Lebanese soil. It diverted not a drop of water. It had no interest in staying. It was in there for one reason: to protect Israel's northern frontier from various guerrillas -- first Yasser Arafat's PLO, then the Lebanese Shiite Party of God (Hezbollah) -- using south Lebanon to attack Israel. Yet for two decades, Israel was hectored to comply with U.N. resolutions demanding Israel's withdrawal. In May 2000, it complied. To ensure that there could be no possible residual territorial dispute, Israel asked the United Nations to draw the line demarcating the true Israeli-Lebanese border -- the so-called Blue Line -- then pulled back behind it. Israel's reward? Hezbollah was not mollified. While its ostensible mission was the liberation of Lebanese territory, it did not disband. On the contrary. It occupied south Lebanon, imported huge new supplies of weapons from Iran and began sporadic cross-border attacks on Israel. Hezbollah has killed Israeli soldiers situated in Israeli territory. It kidnapped three soldiers who have never been seen since. Just one month ago, infiltrators from the Hezbollah territory shot and killed seven Israelis on a road in northern Israel. And now, since the end of March, Hezbollah has embarked on a serious and deadly escalation, firing rockets into Israel. Hezbollah is armed with 8,000 Katyusha rockets. Practically all of northern Israel lies under its guns. They are ready for firing. Hezbollah's spiritual leader, Sheikh Mohammed Hussein Fadlallah, threatened Monday to hit Haifa with Katyusha rockets if Israel dared to respond to Hezbollah attacks. washingtonpost.com