Exhausted after years of devastation due to civil war, invasion by Israel and interference by Syria, the once prosperous and modern nation of Lebanon was laboriously building itself back. Just over a year ago, Lebanon was in the midst of what was being happily called the Cedar Revolution - a gradual democratic change driven by the natural desire of Lebanese citizens to take control of their country out of the hands of the Syrian military. No ham-fisted foreign power was involved in foisting democracy on the Lebanese people as is the case in Iraq. Yet, in little more than a year later, the fresh scent of cedar is overpowered by the the stench of war.
Some of the best and most level headed analyses of the recent Israeli invasion / destruction of Lebanon have appeared on Leiter Reports, written by Thomas Nadelhoffer here, here and here. Among other things, Professor Nadelhoffer asked the following two questions.
- Was Israel's response to Hezbollah proportional to the provocation?
- During war, are some civilian lives more valuable than others?
In response to the first question, Nadelhoffer writes:
"Israeli foreign minister Tzipi Livni had the following response to this line of criticism: “Proportionality is not compared to the event, but to the threat, and the threat is bigger and wider than the captured soldiers.” If one fleshes out the principle of proportionality in this way, is there anything that the principle could not justify? Traditionally, the "harm suffered" part of the principle of proportionality was backward and not forward looking--i.e., in order to see whether a military response x was proportional, one had to look to the past to see how serious the original harm y had been. For instance, if five soldiers of country A were killed by B and A responded by killing a 1000 civilians from B, this would obviously run afoul of the principle of proportionality. Of course, figuring out precisely when the principle has been violated is an admittedly tricky affair."
Indeed it is a tricky affair. Most of us perceive our own pain to be greater than that of others. Retaliation often does not follow the brutal but simple proportional rule of an eye for an eye but rather the disproportionate an eye, nose, ear AND head for an eye. It is futile to argue about proportionality with some one who sees a bigger existential threat contained within a lesser, temporal one. Given the general attitude of Arab and Muslim nations towards Israel (Israel must be pushed into the sea), it is not surprising that Israel is paranoid. But how many Arabs must Israel kill, occupy or push out of their homes before it feels safe within its own borders? A hundred, a thousand, a million ... or all of them? If the shock and awe of overwhelming force, collective punishment and pre-emptive action were effective tools in securing peace, Israel would have been blissfully peaceful by now and Iraq would have been an island of tranquility.
In the second question, Nadelhoffer links to an extraordinarily disturbing article by Alan Dershowitz which ends on this note:
"Every civilian death is a tragedy, but some are more tragic than others."
To which Nadelhoffer asks the following astute question:
"The suggestion that the civilians in Lebanon who 'voluntarily' stayed behind despite well-publicized Israeli warnings for them to flee thereby become complicit with terrorism is particularly problematic given that Israel specifically targeted the kinds of civilian infrastructure that would have made it possible for them to leave (e.g., airports, bridges, highways, etc.). This reminds me of the people who blamed the citizens in New Orleans who did not make it out in time for their dire situation. In both cases, a myriad of personal and economic factors which could explain why citizens might understandably stay behind are entirely ignored in order to legitimate not caring about their plight.
But setting that aside for present purposes, does it seem to anyone else that Derschowitz is essentially saying that the death of Israeli citizens is more tragic than the death of their Lebanese counterparts? After all, don't Israeli citizens have the ability to flee as well? The only way Dershowitz can justify placing the onus entirely on the shoulders of the citizens of Lebanon is if he assumes from the start that Israel is entirely in the right. At least for many people, that is an open question--a question that Dershowitz begs as usual."
But who decides the relative worth of lives, the reality and the morality of one's actions? In the words of George Orwell: (Notes on Nationalism; Indifference to Reality)
"All nationalists have the power of not seeing resemblances between similar sets of facts. A British Tory will defend self-determination in Europe and oppose it in India with no feeling of inconsistency. Actions are held to be good or bad, not on their own merits, but according to who does them, and there is almost no kind of outrage torture, the use of hostages, forced labour, mass deportations, imprisonment without trial, forgery, assassination, the bombing of civilians which does not change its moral colour when it is committed by ‘our’ side ... The nationalist not only does not disapprove of atrocities committed by his own side, but he has a remarkable capacity for not even hearing about them."
I believe Israel has committed and continues to commit a colossal blunder with its latest actions in Lebanon, cynically aided and abetted by the US. (In this case the Democrats are just as culpable as the warmongers on the right) An even bigger blunder for Israel may be to believe that it has a friend in the White House. George Bush and his henchmen (and at least one henchwoman) are probably using Israel as a proxy for prolonging their own failed war on global terrorism. Yesterday Bush made the same fraudulent claims of a link between Hezbollah's attack on Israel and 9/11 that he and Cheney had used to tie Iraq to the event. So we are going to see the sequel to the horror movie that we have been watching since 2003 with probably the same messy ending.
Like Professor Nadelhoffer and other horrified citizens of the world, I too have some urgent questions. What if the US and Israel hadn't broken apart Iraq, Gaza and Lebanon? What if America and Israel had decided to end their toxic symbiotic relationship driven by neo-con ideology and partnered with Europe, Asia and the rest of world in seeking global peace? What if they had decided to "talk" to their enemies instead of within their echo chambers? What if they, even now, recognize that the axis of evil is narrow but the axes of hatred, distrust and despair cast a much wider net? We do not know. We can only wonder.
Found this interesting article in the New Yorker with interviews with Lebanese (politicians, Hezbollah, ordinary folks) about the current situation - many surprisingly insightful statements.
Posted by: Sujatha | August 03, 2006 at 06:22 AM
Sujatha:
Thanks for the link. It is indeed quite revealing. Robin Wright of The Washington Post did a similar piece in which she points out that one of the biggest mistakes the US makes is to lump all Islamic opposition to the west in one generic basket of "terrorism" without taking into consideration what the locals feel. That is why we are surprised again and again when the Palestinians vote for Hamas, the Egyptians elect Muslim Brotherhood members and the Lebanese put Hezbollah in the parliament.
Yesterday's ABC Evening News interviewed some Lebanese Americans in the L.A. and Chicago areas. There were both Muslims and Christians among them. All characterized Hezbollah as a "resistance" group not terrorists. I guess one man's nationalist is another man's terrorist. In Indian history, we have seen that Netaji, Bhagat Singh, Chandrashekhar Azad - all those who offered up armed resistance to the British colonial rule, were termed dangerous terrorists by the British government.
But whatever they are, the US must speak to its "enemies" - Iran, Syria, N. Korea and yes, if necessary to Hezbollah and Hamas. That is what diplomacy is for. Not for constantly riding a high horse like a macho he-man and bringing on disasters.
Posted by: Ruchira Paul | August 03, 2006 at 04:29 PM
Here is a rather long article from the Israeli newspaper, Haaretz. The gradually changing perception of Israel in the mind of most of the world is described here rather chillingly and truthfully. As Warren Goldstein points out, the fawning, uncritical and rabid friends of Israel may be its worst enemies.
Posted by: Ruchira Paul | August 04, 2006 at 12:14 AM