Word: truce
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 2000-2009
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...Scoring the Truce...
...appears unlikely, however, to hold up the cease-fire. Within days, Lebanese Army troops (eventually numbering 15,000) will begin moving into southern Lebanon, later supported by a beefed-up U.N. peacekeeping force (which will also number 15,000), as Israel vacates the area. Hizballah has agreed to the truce in which it ends attacks on Israel and refrains from bearing arms south of the Litani River. Issues ranging from the fate of the prisoners to the disputed Sheba Farms area and the question of disarming Hizballah in line with previous U.N. resolutions are left to future discussions...
...While the truce certainly restricts Hizballah's military activities in southern Lebanon, it falls substantially short of the initial Israeli goal of crushing Hizballah as a military entity and prompting the rest of Lebanese society to turn against the organization because of the destruction by Israel that its actions provoked. Hizballah defined success as its forces simply surviving the Israeli onslaught intact, and exacting a substantial price from the Israelis for their offensive. The U.S. endorsed Israel's objectives - viewing Hizballah as nothing more than a proxy for Iran and Syria - and sought diplomatic cover for Israel by rallying Arab...
...only has Hizballah survived very much intact as a military force; it was able to inflict substantial military and civilian casualties on Israel right until the truce came into effect. Most important, talk of preventing Hizballah's "return" is moot, because it was never actually driven from southern Lebanon, where many of its fighters remain active despite the presence of some 20,000 Israeli troops in their midst. Israel's more realistic goal, of course, was to eliminate the rocket threat on its northern border. The extent to which that has been achieved remains to be seen: Hizballah was firing...
...Although Hizballah will now have to cede control of the border area, and has suffered the loss of an indeterminate number of fighters and missiles, it nonetheless lives (potentially) to fight another day, and to dictate the terms on which it will observe the truce. The Lebanese government doesn't appear to have much enthusiasm for confronting Hizballah on the disarmament issue, mindful of the fact that the group has emerged politically stronger than ever, particularly among its Shi'ite base, and seeking a showdown over disarmament could provoke another ruinous civil...