In January 2004, Hezbollah planted five camouflaged "improvised explosive devices" (IED's) inches on the Israeli side of the border with Lebanon, fifteen miles inland from the Mediterranean coast. Israeli troops detected the IED's and notified (as per the truce agreement in effect since the end of the 1967 Six Days' War) the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL), "peacekeepers." A UNIFIL engineer certified the existence of this gross violation of the truce, and "requested" that Hezbollah remove the bombs. Hezbollah declined, stating that as the mines were (just barely) inside the "Zionist" border, Israel could perform the removal itself. The IDF dispatched an armored bulldozer to carry the mines off for safe disposal. This required making a 90-degree turn from the Israeli access to the narrow border trail. Slowly making this turn, the left front corner of the Israeli bulldozer unavoidably had to occupy, for a couple of seconds, about one cubic meter of air space on the Lebanese side of the "blue line" between the two countries. During those seconds a Hezbollah fighter launched an anti-tank missile at the narrow windshield of the bulldozer. The pinpoint strike, which our Israeli sources concede required uncommon training and skill, killed the 21-year-old Russian immigrant driving the bulldozer, Jan Rotzanski. This diabolical murder was widely celebrated by Hezbollah as a confirmation of its desire to kill "Zionists" on any pretext. IDF Northern Command soldiers remain embittered by this killing (and by UNIFIL's indifference to it) eighteen months later.In a post entitled On the Rim of a Volcano written back in May, Michael Totten writes about a visit to the Israeli-Lebanese border:
Just to put this into perspective, before the House of Commons in Ottawa, Dr. Rachel Ehrenfeld, Director of the American Center for Democracy testified:Eitan pulled off the main road and into his peach orchard next to the fence.
"Lots of drug fields right across the border right here," he said. Hezbollah uses the drug money to purchase weapons to use against Israel. "Across the border are mostly Shia.
Concerning illegal drugs, since the mid-1980s Hezbollah has used illicit drugs as a major funding source and weapon against the west. An official Iranian fatwa ruled: “We are making these drugs for Satan America and the Jews. If we cannot kill them with guns, so we will kill them with drugs.”...In Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley, Hezbollah controls approximately 13,000 acres that produce at least 300 tons of hashish annually, most of which is exported to Europe. This high-quality Lebanese hashish grosses Hezbollah $180 million annually. Hezbollah-run laboratories, refining tons of heroin, are estimated to bring in some $3 billion annually.So much for the Taliban who outlawed opium because it was "against Islam". To claim that Hizbollah has some sort of legality as part of the Lebanese government is absurd. They are terrorists and worse, a scourge not only of Israel, but of the US, and of Europe as well. As my daughter says, "they are mean"-- in a way that cannot be negotiated.
Technorati Tag: Israel and Hezbollah and Hizbollah and Lebanon and Iran.
Kids are smart and sensitive-- they aren't bogged down by the PC mentality, self-loathing, cynical doubt and self-questioning-- consequently, they're more finely attuned to the truth of a situation than adults are.
ReplyDeleteYour daughter's imitation of a soldier is not only timely, it's quite observant and poignantly ironic. You're looking at a MENSA kid of the future.
You're looking at a MENSA kid of the future.
ReplyDeleteI'll be satisfied with a mentsch kid of the future--but in addition to that, MENSA would be nice too.
Thanks.
ReplyDeleteAnd people should be checking out your blog, Colossus of Rhodey, as well.
Nailed.
ReplyDeleteHas a point.
Ha!