Is Israel's reaction in the Lebanon "disproportionate"?

Question

Israel has bombarded Lebanon including its capital, Beirut for over 10 days now. Israel seems to have two aims - recover the two captured soldiers and eliminate Hizbollah. The Israelis have lost far more than two Isreali lives in its efforts so far. So I believe Israel's real aim is to eliminate Hizbollah. Some countries have suggested Israel's actions are disproportionate; Britain and the USA have not. What do you think?

There's been some strong opinion vented here. I personally think Israel does have the right to get rid of Hizbollah. But I do think it needs to do it carefully whether that is "proportionate " or not. I do not, for example favour Israel targeting Lebanese civilians, hospitals etc, some of which does seem to be happening. I also think it has to be said that Israel was formed from terrorist gangs such as the Stern movement who fought Britain to get the state established. Some of these gangs used extremely horrible tactics such as skinning people alive and then string them up. But I think Israel has learnt since those days and certainly until recently, has imo had a moral superiority over its neighbours. israel must not now lose that moral advantage.

Answer 1

Absolutly not, Isreal has the right to defend itself. What if we had an enemy on our border, that exists only to kill us all, has been killing civilians for decades, that attacked us? Would anyone but liberal hand wringers be oppsed to us striking, and striking hard? What if it was Chicago being rocketed, or Dallas? What if it was your son that had been kidnapped?

Answer 2

I used to sympathise with Israel being completely surrounded by Arab states.

I dont now. In fact, I'm beginning to sympathise with the Lebanese, and I am sure a lot of people feel the same. And, that is exactly what the Israelis should not want. They are fast losing the support of the western world.

At the end of the day, when the IRA, bombed England, we did not sink to their level and bomb Ireland in return, so why, when Israel knows that Hizbollah have kidnapped 2 Israeli soldiers, do they think they have the right to bomb Lebanon in return.

Answer 3

OK, so, now, in order for a country to protect itself, it must fight at the level of those that attack it... that makes no sense what-so-ever.
If an organization or country is stupid enough to attack a country or organization MUCH stronger than itself, then they should be willing to pay the price. As for territory lost during those aggressions... If it's lost in a war, it's lost. I'm glad to see that Israel is standing up for itself again. I'll be even more glad to see those radical organizations destroyed once and for all.
It's time that the UN goes the way of the League of Nations for the same reasons as the League of Nations... failure to act when action is required; failure to back up resolutions that it passes; and the ridiculous hypocracy of the UN. Diplomacy will only succeed when all parties actually want peace. The Palestinians, Hezbollah, Hamas, and the other radical Islamists do not want peace, so no Diplomacy will ever succeed.

Answer 4

"Dispropotionate" wont do justice Israel has killed 400 lebanese civilians 1/3 of them children, I dont know if they have killed one hezbollah guy so far. Israel as a bully is doing its job by wiping out lebanon so it takes them 50 years to rebuild. Good job Israel for showing those innocent lebanese children how powerful you are just wait and see when you are infront of god on the day when no one is safe from his or her deeds. Israelis is Israel believe the war is crazy and an over reaction what are you guys talking about.

Answer 5

Every country has the right to defend themselves.!!!
Every country has the right to defend themselves.!!!!
Every country has the right to defend themselves.!!!

This is just another talking point for their aggression. As far as I concern Israel is just using the whole WWII Holocaust to look week and to shame the world in to not attacking it so the can have free rein to do what ever they want. Every time that a dignitary visit Israel the make him/Her pass the History memorial they errected to the victims, yet they have no problem to do on to thers what was done to them.They are using the blood of their own ancestor to promulgate this image of the helpless lamb while in fact it is a wolf in sheep's clothing and if you say anithing bad about them then you are an anti-hasidic.

Answer 6

I think Israel is being very restrained about this. Personally, I'd back track on missile launches and fire a battlefield nuke at the last known position. As for children being killed - forget the political correctness. it's war. People die. One day, Hizbollah (or should it be Herbollah - for effeminate cowards who hide behind civilians and children) will realise that they and they alone are responsible for the deaths of their own people. That's if any survive.

Answer 7

No, it is proportionate its military dominance - ranked number 4 in world military spending behind the US, France and the UK.

Its been kidnapping and killing anyone it does not like and terrorised its opponents into giving up their land. The remaining palestinians are now being starved to death in the worlds biggest prison camp.

It is in proportion to the excuses the Europeans used to wipe out the native populations of America and Australia.

Is it morally justified? The answer to this question is no.

Answer 8

Israel is doing the right thing. While I like Bush and all, I wish he would take a lesson or two from Israel. I think that instead of needlessly endangering our troops by having them patrol and go house to house in hostile neighborhoods like the Sunni triangle and Sadr city, he should bomb them into dust. After all, he did promise us a campaign of shock and awe!

Answer 9

If Israel aim was to eliminate Hazbollah, it would not bomb Beyrut.
Hazbollah is located in the south of the country. Besides, if to think in yerms of proportuons, almost 400 Lebanese people died during 10 days in comparison with 34 Israeli persons. Should Lebanon seek a proportion 1:1 now?

I liked explanation of one person:

"Lebanon is a small country. They have no army worth the name, just a small border patrol armed with light weapons capable of taking on drug smugglers and not much else. They have no air force, just a few lightly-armed choppers for taking on said drug smugglers. They have no navy, just a few coast guard cutters (again for dealing with said smugglers). The Lebanese government hasn't fired a shot in anger against anybody since the end of their civil war in, what was it, 1991? Which is when their "armed forces" were basically re-formed as a small lightly armed police force with very little ability to take on anything larger than a few smugglers. This was done on purpose, BTW -- in the civil war, the military was used against fellow Lebanese until it disintegrated, so having a large military, as far as the Lebanese are concerned, is just asking for renewed oppression of the Lebanese people by whoever happens to currently hold the reins of the military.

Now, a small gang of armed criminals in the south of Lebanon kidnaps a couple of Israeli soldiers who were either inside Lebanon or damned close to the border. The Lebanese government doesn't have sufficient military power to take on this small gang (maybe 500 full-time fighters, but well armed by Syria and Iran). Let's see what the correct response is for the nation that has the second most-powerful military on the planet (behind the United States -- China and Russia may have more soldiers, but they don't have Israel's military technology):

a) Send in some Special Forces troops with air support, find the bastards who kidnapped your troops, and kill them.

OR:

b) Bomb civilian towns and neighborhoods into rubble, kill hundreds if not thousands of innocent civilians, destroy the commercial center of the Jordan-Syria-Lebanon triad (the port and airport of Beirut), and announce that this is all self defense because the government of Lebanon lacked the ability to take on large gangs of armed criminals due to lack of a military.

I'm sorry, but when does lack of a military justify bombing civilian hospitals (yes, at least one hospital has been bombed, I saw the pictures), civilian apartment buildings, airports, and sea ports?

Sure, sending in your troops to clean out the criminals is plenty justified, and I don't think anybody here would have a problem with that. If they'd just bombed the south of Lebanon in order to get the civilian population to flee so they could move in and finish off Hezbollah, I doubt anybody here would have a problem with that either, except for the most rabid Jew-haters for whom Israel can never do anything that isn't evil. But bombing the most peaceful city in the Middle East (Beirut) because they are TOO PEACEFUL, that is just sick, sick, sick. I'm sorry, it just can't be justified, period.

But hey, [sarcasm on] I suppose believing in peace is a crime in today's world, so it's perfectly justifiable to kill anybody who believes in peace. [/sarcasm off]"


If you think a response of israel is OK, and we accept this type of moral as base for our behaviour: would be not right to attack US in reaction to the fact that some US soldiers behaved as criminals and slaughtered entire family of Iraqui or raped an Iraqui girl? If to follow your logic, it would be absolutely justified.

Answer 10

"disproportionate" is the latest idiotic political buzzword.
What does this mean? That Israel should kill exactly 8 Hezbollah members and kidnap exactly two?

The purpose of this "proportionate" talk is to prevent Israel from doing what it needs to do -- destroy the anti-Semitic Hezbollah cult.

Answer 11

What moral superiority you are talking about.They (Israeli)are terrorist from Day1 and now they have come out in open.What right do they have to kill innocent children.They are forgetting that these very children would tomorrow their fiercest opponents.Where is you fair sense and enlightenment when an Arab child is being murdered cold blooded.