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| 20/05/2008 CIRCUMSTANCES AHEAD OF ISRAEL'S HUMILIATING PULLOUT IN 2000
Shortly after the harsh Israeli defeat in Operation Grapes of Wrath on Lebanon in April 1996, Likud Party chairman Benjamin Netanyahu was elected as Prime Minister. He surprised many by beating the Labor Party represented by his rival Shimon Peres. But Netanyahu was facing a hard task; he wanted to bring back the pride of Israel's army that was melting in the furnace of Hezbollah's Katyusha rockets.
As a result, Netanyahu came up with the slogan: Lebanon First.
Through his slogan, the Israeli Prime Minister, sought to deal a severe blow to Hezbollah's arms, then extract security guarantees from Syria and Lebanon as a preliminary step toward the complete withdrawal from the "security zone" in south Lebanon. Netanyahu was seeking to put direct pressure on Hezbollah instead of pressuring Syria to demand Hezbollah stops it war of attrition in the South.
Netanyahu was for a ground operation to penetrate areas where Hezbollah's resistance fighters are located. Ironically, this confrontation killed and injured more Israeli soldiers from the elite brigades Givati and Golani. Even the highly trained Egoz unit couldn't hold on for more than a year.
When he failed on the ground, Netanyahu resorted to helicopters to drop his Special Forces in Hezbollah areas. In February 1997, seventy-three Israel Special Forces soldiers were killed when two helicopters collided near the Lebanese borders. The sea became Netanyahu's only option left. He chose his top elites soldiers for a major security operation that would begin from the renowned coastal southern town of Ansariyyeh.
But Islamic resistance bombs were enough to end the Israeli operation before it even started. Full of frustration and disappointment, the conquered elite unit delivered Netanyahu a message that Israel's presence in Lebanon was doomed to end.
Netanyahu who succeeded a defeated Prime Minister now became a defeated successor, who would clear the seat for another Prime Minister, who will be defeated as well.
Labor took the rule in Israel following the 1999 elections. On Premier Ehud Barak's agenda was the "withdrawal from Lebanon" on the 7th of July 2000.
But for any pullout to take place there should be either a unilateral withdrawal without guarantees – and this is the very defeat – or a pullout in the framework of an agreement that secures northern settlements on the one hand and realizes a good deal of political gains.
Barak set his eyes on the second possibility.
As usual, the US diplomacy got busy on the Washington - Damascus course what resulted in a tripartite summit including Syria, Israel and US in the Shepherdstown farm, West Virginia. But ambitious Barak was frustrated. Syrian President Hafez el-Assad's insisted that any Israeli pullout should extend from the Golan in the north to the 4th of June line. The price was too expensive for Barak to pay. Indeed, Barak's pledge to withdraw became his own nightmare. With everything lost, and in a moment of deep contemplation, Barak found that his long-desired objective in fact lies in his experienced ally: Collaborator Antoine Lahd's army
To be continued…
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