As’ad AbuKhalil is a professor of political science at California State University, Stanislaus and University of California, Berkeley. He is widely known as the Angry Arab, after his blog of the same name (http://angryarab.blogspot.com), where he comments on politics in the Middle East and beyond. At Ryerson University last week, AbuKhalil took questions from The Varsity about the causes and consequences of Israel’s campaign against Lebanon last summer.
Hizbullah walked into Israel and kidnapped two soldiers and killed several others. Is this not a clear cause and provocation for a just war?
If it is, then the Lebanese have 11,782 pretexts because Israel, since 2000, has crossed the Blue Line [the border between Israel and Lebanon] 11,782 times. So if we want to use that logic, those who support Israel’s right to launch a war on Lebanon based on that pretext, should, logically speaking, follow the conclusion … that Lebanon should have fought 11,782 wars on Israel.
But do the Israelis kill and kidnap?
Absolutely, they do. Not only, worse … I’m from the city of Tyre in South Lebanon-last year alone they kidnapped a fisherman from the city of Tyre, he still hasn’t been returned, and they also killed a shepherd. And these things are very regular.
So what is the cause of the war?
It is very clear that the Israelis have been wanting to take a large-scale operation in Lebanon at their own behest, and at the behest of the Americans in order to hopefully achieve for Bush a victory that has long eluded him in Iraq.
Then why did Hizbullah give them a provocation?
Lebanon is in state of war with Israel and Israel still occupies Lebanese territory, and under international law the Lebanese are entitled, Hizbullah and others-
But according to international law, the Shebaa Farms are not part of Lebanon.
That’s not true. International law doesn’t take a stand, as much as the U.S. State Department and Western press and the Secretary-General of the United Nations try to claim otherwise. Countries come to bilateral agreements to borders and then deposit them at the United Nations. It does not take a stand and has absolutely no valid juridical opinion on where borders should reside.
Hizbullah is a non-state actor-
Hizbullah is a non-state actor; however, it has the legitimacy of state because the Lebanese Council of Ministers, the highest executive power of the government of Lebanon, included in its official cabinet statement endorsement and support for what is called the Resistance Movement in Lebanon, in reference to Hizbullah.
Hizbullah hides among civilians, whereas Israel warns the population before it bombs them.
I lived through various stages of Israeli wars on Lebanon, and I absolutely never once in my life have heard warnings by Israeli forces before they bombed us.
Sometimes they send symbolic leaflets, but the leaflets say basically, “you have to leave within two hours an area where half a million people live.” This is not supposed to in any way adhere to the rules of war. This is only intended [for] propaganda purposes.
Hizbullah is part of the population. The people are Hizbullah, they are part of the village. When they say “hide behind civilians,” what do they mean by that? These are their houses. These are their streets, their alleys, their villages, their towns, their cities.
Is Hizbullah a terrorist organization?
I don’t want to become like Arab-American or Arab-Canadian organizations, having to answer to the terminology and the parameters of debate set by the American government and media. But I have no problem saying that, to the same extent that American warfare uses methods to target civilians, yes, Hizbullah have used methods of warfare in the 1980s that resulted in the harm and death of civilians-and this in my dictionary can amount to terrorism-just as America’s warfare in Iraq has been terroristic.
What are the consequences of the war on Lebanon?
The Lebanese political system has been shattered to its foundations. The government has all but collapsed. We can also expect in the long term of the Arab-Israel question some significant consequences. The vulnerability of the Israelis has been exposed to all.
I think many Arabs are now going to be much more firm believers of the righteousness of resistance against Israel-not in the form of the bombast of Arab regimes and Yasser Arafat-but in the form of a very sustained, well-calculated, calibrated resistance the way Hizbullah has fought in south Lebanon. A large measure of the admiration for Hizbullah is not based on admiration of its ideology-you have many leftists and secularists who have good things to say about Hizbullah-but because of the way they have managed their resistance against Israeli occupation.
Clarification: Due to a mis-transcription, the passage where As’ad AbuKhalil stated that “The vulnerability of the Israelis has been exposed to all,” should have read “The vulnerability of Israel has been exposed to all.”
