HAVE they all been struck dumb? For five days as Israel intensified its assault on Lebanon, the only sound in the UN Secretary-General’s office and the capitals of the world has been the diplomatic shuffling of awkward feet. The silence of international leaders is as unwise as Israel’s own response to Hizbullah’s provocation.
This is not the first time that Israel has launched an overkill operation against the people of Lebanon. The real target is always elsewhere — on this occasion, to disarm rightwing Likud opposition in the run-up to the Israeli elections. On the last occasion, in July 1993, Yitzhak Rabin vowed to silence Hizbullah once and for all. Then as now, civilians were killed, thousands fled and Hizbullah lived to launch its not very effective rockets another year.
But there was one important difference: some Western leaders and governments did actually open their mouths. Last time the Clinton administration blamed Israel in the same breath as Hizbullah, saying that “military activities directed against all civilians should stop”. And Boutros Boutros-Ghali said that it was “deplorable” for any government to adopt policies that would lead to more displaced persons. If all this could be said three years ago, why not now?
Israel’s action is to be condemned, firstly because it goes far beyond the internationally recognised principle of “proportionate response”. Quite apart from the human suffering involved, the scale of Israeli “reprisal” against Lebanon is so disproportionate as to constitute aggression in its own right.
Second, the action breaches international agreements on the protection of civilian populations in time of war. No rational person could regard 400 000 south Lebanese as collectively responsible for the activities of some 500 Hizbullah activists in a few areas. Indeed Israel itself does not pretend that they are: Shimon Peres and his colleagues are quite open about seeking to punish the Lebanese government by terrorising its people.
Mr Peres’s political difficulties in the wake of the Hamas bombings have been compounded by Hizbullah. Some response was to be expected but this protracted campaign has an air of desperation. Naming it Operation Grapes of Wrath evokes the verses in Deuteronomy which vow that “their day of disaster is near”. Hizbullah will survive: it is the confidence needed for the peace process that has been dealt another disastrous blow.