Human shields, and war crimes waiting to happen on Hizballah's part. And nothing will be done to stop them. There is certainly no political will in Lebanon or at the U.N. to do so, just as prior calls for Hizballah to disarm have not been worth the paper they're printed on.
No, if and when hostilities resume (and Hizballah isn't amassing all these arms to sit and look at them), this report will be long forgotten, and almost everyone will blame Israel. "US envoy Oren warns: Hizbullah has 15,000 rockets on border," from the Jerusalem Post, September 3:
Hizbullah has an arsenal of approximately 15,000 rockets amassed on Lebanon's border with Israel, including some with a long enough range to hit the southern city of Eilat, US envoy Michael Oren told AFP on Friday.
"The Syrian-Iranian backed Hizbullah poses a very serious threat to Israel...Hizbullah today now has four times as many rockets as it had during the 2006 Lebanon war. These rockets are longer-range. Every city in Israel is within range right now, including Eilat," he said.
Oren expressed Israeli concerns with Hizbullah's concealment of the weapons as well.
"In 2006, many of their missiles were basically out in the open, in silos and the Israeli air force was able to neutralize a great number of them...Today those same missiles have been placed under hospitals, and homes and schools because Hizbullah knows full well if we try to defend ourselves against them, we will be branded once again as war criminals."
This was not the first time that Oren has warned of the threat that Hizbullah poses to Israel. Following a clash on the northern border between the Lebanese Army and IDF soldiers last month, in which Lebanese soldiers opened fire on two IDF officers, killing one and seriously wounding the other, Oren warned that the distinction between Lebanon's Army and Hizbullah has become "cloudy." He expressed concerns that advanced weaponry given to the regular army could find its way into the hands of the Islamist group.
Following the border clashes and Oren's warnings, the US Congress voted to suspend $100 million in aid to the Lebanese Armed Forces.
Coincidentally, Hizballah had a three-story arms depot blow up just today. No word in this report what this building may have been near, but it is in what is supposed to be a demilitarized zone following the 2006 war. "Middle East: 'Hezbollah arms depot' explodes," from AdnKronos International, September 3:
Beruit, 3 Sept. (AKI) - A suspected Hezbollah arms depot in southern Lebanon caught fire on Friday setting off a series of explosions and injuring five people, according to the NowLebanon website.
The three-floor building in the southern Lebanese coastal city of Chehabiyya - about 80 kilometres south of Beirut - was being used as a Hezbollah arms depot, NowLebanon reported, citing unnamed sources quoted.
Nothing to see here:
Lebanese soldiers arrived to cordon off the area and prevent access to media, according to the report.
Chehabiyya is part of a volatile border zone south of the Litani River in which Hezbollah has been banned from having weapons under a U.N. resolution that ended the 2006 war between the militant group and Israel....
"Chehabiyya is part of a volatile border zone.."
"Volatile"
And in what is no doubt a "restive" part of the country.
"Volatile." "Restive."
"Restive." "Volatile."
Israel needs to lay a complaint now before the UN and call for all civilians to leave the areas affected.
..but not before they/it deal{s} with Arizona..So much more interesting,insofar as power tripping and freedom grabbing go..The "United Nations" is it?..Now if..Oh my time's up?..Yeah,thanks for nothing..f**k you too..
Israeli ambassador to U.S.: Hizballah has 15,000 rockets hidden beneath hospitals, homes, and schools
................
And this could not have been done on the qt—which either means these Lebanese support Hizb'allah's using their homes, schools and hospitals as weapons dumps, or that they are so terrified of Hizb'allah that they don't dare go to the government or the UN to complain.
And what if they had? The Lebanese government and the UN are both disturbingly supportive of Hizb'allah and many of their aims, as well as, it seems, utterly unable to stand against them in any way.
More:
No, if and when hostilities resume (and Hizballah isn't amassing all these arms to sit and look at them), this report will be long forgotten, and almost everyone will blame Israel.
................
All too true. This has become like some sort of insane kabuki theater—I can already see the faux-outraged headlines.
This is what happens when you do not crush your mortal foe with utter determination and the intention to prevail and to survive.
Half wars are just invitations to greater new wars.
Fight to win, or lose in the end.
History is replete with the bones of the indecisive.
This sort of activity, hiding behind civilians and putting them at risk, IS a war crime. It is called perfidy. People should become familiar with it's definition, history, and current disuse.
Who cares where the bombs are? Blow them all up I say, "Hizballah" and the Lebanese have nobody to blame but themselves for this mess. They can't launch rockets out of hospitals then cry unfair when we blow the shit out of em.
If they're that anxious to meet Allah then godspeed to them, let's assist them in that endeavor! Let's make martyrs of every last terrorist and damnation to every pansied-ass liberal who fusses with a lisp whenever Israel fights tyranny!
Even criminals who know full well that what they do is wrong still come up with excuses for their behaviour: "They were stupid and deserved it," or "If I hadn't done it, someone else would have," and so on. Thus, we must know that the Muslims have any store of excuses to get over the truth of their own evil. Beyond that, there's no reason for anyone to discuss it with them. It's not a matter for discussion. It's a matter of who kills and destroys the other to the point of victory. I don't mean the Israelis are interested in victory, they are not. They think that if they actually beat the enemy they'll poison the relationship with the Muslims eternally. The Israelis actually want peace, not victory. They think in terms of centuries. I think about today, tomorrow, maybe next year sometime. I think victory. I don't care what happens later. I'm not a nation. I'm one guy, like most others.
As one guy, I think winning is important. Thing is, in a situation like this I don't much care about the "rules." The Muslims don't want to play by the rules, and I don't either. We're on level ground there. I don't have to worry about anything other than prudence, i.e. my own behind. So long as that is covered, everything is covered. I want victory. I don't think the Muslims do.
I think the Muslims want a permanent state of war in which they never have to live boring lives of getting up in the morning to go to the office to make a salary, coming home to give the money to the wife to pay the bills, repeating till death in old age. I think the Muslims are violent drama queens who want to goof-off with guns and bombs. (Shh: They aren't the only ones.)
Even among good people like us there are bad people who don't care if people think we should all be pure. When the bad guys don't play by the rules, why should our bad guys? Now, I'm a good guy, believe me, and yet, I don't mind at all if our bad guys do bad things to their bad guys. In fact, I just don't care. If our bad guys were to grab extra-territorially and do stuff, I don't care. No rules.
If there were rules, reciprocal, then I might care. There are no rules. I don't care if our bad guys are really bad. No problem with it. I like victory. But that's me, and I'm just one guy typing some more.
well nothing wrong with that if the Israelis can also have their 15 or more nuclear heads under the same room. whats the noise about it? nonsense
Warn those who are harbouring weapons for Hezbollah that their house will be bombed if so much as a fire cracker goes off within its boundary. Problem solved.
If this doesn't work - plan 2.
A leaflet drop warning citizens of Southern Lebanon to leave their homes - and then level the entire area. Problem solved.
Make it a problem for Hezbollah and for the Lebanese government. They are putting their people in harms way. Israel can then go in there and finish the job properly, laying claim to Southern Lebanon until a suitable peace keeping force can be installed. This does not include the UN. They must obviously accept some, if not all, blame for allowing this to come about.
There won't be future problems when Southern Lebanon is "out of bounds" to everyone - except a vigilant and empowered peace keeping force.
I suppose that we are supposed to believe that Hizballah is planning on playing tiddily winks with all those weapons.
I blame the "world", the UN, the Democrats, the liberals, the MSM, and anti-semitism in general for their looking the other way on this. The ONLY explanation is that mainstream liberalism must be virulantly anti-semitic. So much so, in fact, that they are willing to embrace Islam and fight WWII all over again; this time with the stated intention of wiping out the Jews.
Apologies for the typo in the first sentence above.
Interesting what SonofWalker said. I like the Israeli goal to be to stay alive and thrive with democracy until 2050. 2050, because it's a nice round date and you can make time-related plans with a date mentioned. Other than that it's arbitrary. This goal should motivate the Israeli's mightily.
The Muslims just want to destroy a country that arguably would not harm a hair on anyone's head if not compelled to fight in defense. And that moreover could give its neighbors a lot more wealth if cooperated with or just left alone. (That too should be an Israeli goal). So all the effort and money into that weaponsystem by the Muslims of Hezbollah and its allies is wasted and could have been much better spent.
I like Gratitude's approach, and I read in Jerusalem Post that Israel is preparing for a new kind of (defensive) war, not one like the past wars, which is what presumably Hezbollah wants to fight.
Anyway, there's a strategy called MAD, Mutually Assured Destruction; and yes, the Israeli's could give the Lebanese notice to evacuate before all hell breaks loose after Hizbollah foolishly started a new war. And they could even now already inform the Southern Lebanese and the Lebanese government that that is the consequence of being too afraid or allied of/ with Hezbollah and so not stopping its putting massive amounts of rockets and other weapons under hospitals, schools and homes! Yes, that really should be a Lebanese problem, not an Israeli one.
And I think also that paradoxically Israel is too soft on it's real prime enemy; Islam. It should tie it's (Democratic) existence and well-being to that of Muslims, in an as humane and intelligent way as possible.
Even Mecca, Iranian and other Islamic targets should be mentioned to get retaliation from Israel in case Israel would collapse. The reasonable way out for Muslims is to let Israel and its democracy stay alive and thrive, until 2050 and beyond.
Israel warned Syria several months ago that if Syrian supplied missiles were used by Hezbollah against Israel, Syria would cease to exist...
I've been advocating such an Israeli deterrence policy since the 2006 war. Threatening to destroy Lebanon has no deterrence value: Hezbollah, Syria and Iran would all be more than willing to sacrifice Lebanon in order to devastate Israel with a sustained rocket barrage. But threatening to destroy Syria ups the ante and introduces a bonafide deterrence into the equation.
Syria will keep Hezbollah on a short leash if its survival is at stake.
So far the Israeli's never dared to hold Syria directly accountable for the behavior of Hezbollah, with the implication that Israel would strike Syria when Hezbollah strikes Israel, for fear of escalation. Probably Israel also always was held back by US and UN.
I too support such a deterrence-policy, such a MAD-Mutually Assured Destruction-Policy. For the connection between Syria and Hezbollah cannot be denied. The bigger response would be more just and effective than the limited response to these "tools" of Syria and Iran. It would even "comfort" many Lebanese who now rightly can say they are being sacrificed for Iran's and Syria's interests in only a limited response to a Hezbollah-attack.
Notice how Hizb'allah is actually *counting* on the decency of Israel and the West.
Israel would of course never do such a thing—they try to protect their civilians as much as possible—but if they did, it would not be any sort of deterrent for Hizb'allah or any other Jihadist.
They would, in fact, be all to glad for the chance to murder a few Israeli citizens along with taking out a military installation.
Nor would they care about the "bad press" from the rest of the civilized world. Any organization that deliberately murders a group of unarmed civilians—including a pregnant woman—as Hizb'allah did recently—cares nothing for such matters.
Why arm themselves with all these weapons if not to force a confrontation with Israel? As in the previous 'border war' of 2006, there will be no winners, the losers being the Lebanese civilians. It is very unfortunate Hizbullah has forced hiding their weapons amongst the population, whether it was done by force or voluntarily accepting this, it will lead to many casualties. This time, I believe Israel has a different strategy and will utilize airborne surveillance to a maximum advantage, destroying any and all targets identified as Hizbullah strongholds or weapons launching areas; Hizbullah conversely will fire rockets mostly into civilian populations, having both Jewish and Arab citizens, causing mass casualties as well. There will be no winners but the LAF aka Hizbullah will suffer tremendously. If Iran declares war, Syria and Venezuela will follow....