Hezbollah will turn its attention to resisting normal relations with Israel if Syria and Lebanon reach a peace settlement with the Jewish state, according to the Shi\’ite group\’s leader.
King Hussein\’s latest medical crisis — and his abrupt replacement last month of Prince Hassan with his eldest son, 37-year-old Prince Abdullah, as heir to the Hashemite throne — worry Israelis more than they like to admit.
The attacks marked the heaviest cross-border violence since a cease-fire in 1996 ended with Operation Grapes of Wrath, Israel\’s 16-day campaign in Lebanon against Hezbollah.
For the first time ever, an Arab citizen of Israel is running for prime minister. He is first-term Knesset member Azmi Bishara, one of the leading intellectuals in the Arab world, and one of the most provocative politicians of any ethnicity in Israel.
A new coded message has entered the chilly lexicon of Israeli anxiety. \”Heavy fighting is taking place in Lebanon,\” intones the news reader. Hundreds of mothers and fathers with soldier sons serving across the northern border know immediately what that means. There are casualties, but the families have not yet been notified.
Israel signed the Oslo peace agreement with itsold enemy, Yasser Arafat, because by 1993 the alternatives had becomeinsufferable. The Palestinian intifada, a revolt of thestreet, was sapping the morale of the Israeli army, fighting a futilesix-year battle with one hand tied behind its back. Nightlytelevision footage of soldiers in combat fatigues, chasing teenageboys wielding slingshots and petrol bombs, was undermining Israel\’sdeterrent credibility in its confrontation with the Arab states aswell as its international moral case.
Since the beginning of this year, 103 Israeli soldiers have died in, or on their way to, war in Lebanon. Twelve lost their lives in a botched marine commando raid last week. The total death toll since the 1982 \”Peace for Galilee\” invasion nowstands at about 1,200, and since the pullback to the South Lebanese security zone in 1985, some 500 soldiers have died.
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