Juan Cole and occupation politics
I usually like what Juan Cole has to say about, well, pretty much everything, but this stuck me as a bit odd:
"the Irish Times ... says that Israeli officials reject a UN deployment and insist instead that the Lebanese army must be stationed along the border. It is probably the Olmert government's hope that this posting will set the Lebanese army against Hizbullah, producing intra-Lebanese fighting that serves Israeli interests."
What Israeli interests does this serve, other than the very reasonable interest that the people of Haifa, Safed, Nahariya, etc., not get shot at by Lebanese citizens? It sounds so nefarious -- the army will be "set against" Hizbullah, generating "intra-Lebanese fighting." Well, why shouldn't the Lebanese army be "set against" Hizbullah? If a paramilitary force is attacking another nation from within your borders, isn't it one of your fundamental obligations as a state to, you know, try and stop them?
Cole also blames all the violence on Israeli occupation, and I think it's worth noting some differences in meaning. Juan Cole is probably thinking of Israel in the West Bank, which looks something like this:
But Hizbullah's leader, Nasrallah, says his group is bombing "occupied northern Palestine." In other words, all of Israel is occupied territory, including the 3-million-strong Tel Aviv metropolitan area, the "occupation" of which began, I suppose, with the city's founding around 1909. That looks more like this:
There won't be peace in the Middle East so long as Israel is occupying the West Bank and bombing Lebanon, but there won't be an end to those kinds of occupation so long as most of the region considers every breath drawn by any Israeli to be an act of oppression.
"the Irish Times ... says that Israeli officials reject a UN deployment and insist instead that the Lebanese army must be stationed along the border. It is probably the Olmert government's hope that this posting will set the Lebanese army against Hizbullah, producing intra-Lebanese fighting that serves Israeli interests."
What Israeli interests does this serve, other than the very reasonable interest that the people of Haifa, Safed, Nahariya, etc., not get shot at by Lebanese citizens? It sounds so nefarious -- the army will be "set against" Hizbullah, generating "intra-Lebanese fighting." Well, why shouldn't the Lebanese army be "set against" Hizbullah? If a paramilitary force is attacking another nation from within your borders, isn't it one of your fundamental obligations as a state to, you know, try and stop them?
Cole also blames all the violence on Israeli occupation, and I think it's worth noting some differences in meaning. Juan Cole is probably thinking of Israel in the West Bank, which looks something like this:
But Hizbullah's leader, Nasrallah, says his group is bombing "occupied northern Palestine." In other words, all of Israel is occupied territory, including the 3-million-strong Tel Aviv metropolitan area, the "occupation" of which began, I suppose, with the city's founding around 1909. That looks more like this:
There won't be peace in the Middle East so long as Israel is occupying the West Bank and bombing Lebanon, but there won't be an end to those kinds of occupation so long as most of the region considers every breath drawn by any Israeli to be an act of oppression.