Sunni Muslims, Christians and the Druze have no desire to pay for the martial vanity of the Hezbollah leader, Hassan Nasrallah. Nor will they take kindly to his transforming the devastation into a political victory.
Some even welcome Israel’s intervention. As one Lebanese politician said to me in private (but would never dare say in public) Israel must not stop now. It sounds cynical, he said, but ‘for things to get better in Lebanon, Nasrallah must be weakened further.’
And:
Even some Shiites are beginning to have doubts about Nasrallah. If interviewed on television they will praise Hezbollah, but when the cameras are off, there are those who will suddenly become more critical.
Slightly off point, but in search of documentation for something I want to assert (I have a distinct recollection of Lebanese villagers dancing in the streets when Israel first occupied Lebanon back in 1982 --because they were tired of PLO rule with its Baathist atrocities like bride-rapes and body-hacking. I think I read it in Human Events), I found an analysis of IDF strategy during the occupation that included the observation that IDF was hampered militarily by its concern for civilians:
Concern for casualties was a real influence on MOUT operations. The rules of engagement prohibited indiscriminate useof supporting arms, particularly in Tyre and Sidon, and the ethical framevork of the IDF makes it very difficult for its soldiers to accept heavy civilian casualties as a necessary part of war. The Israeli concern for friendly casualties is wellknown, and in a war where time has become less important andwhere the ends are somewhat controversial, concern for friendly casualties assumes an even greater significance.
An interesting insight into Israeli military "culture," no?
