Hezbollah: Borderline Crazy?

Hezbollah is very big on borders.

These days, Hezbollah is preoccupied with the maritime borders between Israel and Lebanon:

Deputy secretary general of Hezbollah says Lebanon will protect its rights in face of Israeli threats as Israel-Lebanon conflict on their maritime economic border escalates.

But when maritime borders are not the issue, Hezbollah will always have the Israeli-Lebanese border--and Hezbollah has never failed to exploit the Lebanese border with Israel:

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.

When you hear reports that the Obama administration is weighing opening talks with Hezbollah--it may be beneficial to recall just who are these people the US wants to speak to.

Technorati Tag: Israel and Lebanon and Hezbollah.