Photo by: Courtesy
Enclaves refer to land that is in sovereign Israeli territory but is on the other side of the border fence, which does not always run directly parallel to the internationally recognized border known as the Blue Line.
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On Tuesday, an IDF entrance into one of these enclaves, near the Israeli community of Misgav Am, was what likely triggered the clashes that ended with one dead IDF senior officer and three dead Lebanese soldiers.
This, however, does not mean that Israel is wrong in entering the enclaves, some of which are hundreds of meters south of the actual border. The IDF’s Northern Command is of the opinion that it is crucial to operate within the enclaves to show the Lebanese that Israel is present in all of its territory, a so-called declaration of sovereignty.
There are also security benefits to operating within the enclaves. On July 12, 2006, Hizbullah guerrillas launched an attack against an IDF patrol from within one of these enclaves and abducted reservists Eldad Regev and Ehud Goldwasser, in the incident that sparked the Second Lebanon War.
Since the war, the IDF has entered these enclaves almost every day. In some cases it coordinates with UNIFIL to prevent misunderstandings like that which happened on Tuesday – if in fact the Lebanese Armed Forces’ attack was the result of a misunderstanding, and was not premeditated as some IDF sources have speculated. In these cases, it even crosses the fence with tanks and jeeps.
Other times, though, the IDF enters the enclaves covertly and often remains inside for full days.
“If we are not there, Hizbullah will be there,” a top officer stationed along the Lebanese border said recently, explaining that by operating within the enclaves, the IDF was making it difficult for Hizbullah to launch attacks along the border like it did in 2006.
“This way, Hizbullah will have to start its next attack further from the border, meaning that we will hopefully have more of a warning that something is happening,” he said.
The Northern Command is also working with UNIFIL to complete the marking of the Israeli-Lebanese border. This is done with blue-and-white barrels that are placed every few hundred meters and form a clear line of where the border runs, in the absence of a fence along the Blue Line.
The rapid sequence of events and their timing left some defense officials wondering Tuesday whether the three attacks on the nation’s borders were somehow linked and possibly connected to the pressure Iran is currently under with the new round of international sanctions.
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What is more likely, though, is that Israel’s deterrence is eroding and needs to be bolstered to prevent similar attacks in the future. This rule applies to Hamas in Gaza – behind the rocket attack on Friday and possibly the Katyusha fire on Monday from Egypt – as well as the Lebanese Armed Forces, which attacked the IDF on Tuesday.
The attack on Israeli troops near Misgav Am did not come as a surprise for the army’s Northern Command. In 2009, LAF soldiers pointed their guns at IDF troops on five occasions, mostly after the Israelis crossed into enclaves that are Israeli but sit between the border fence and the Blue Line. Since the beginning of 2010, the number of times the LAF has pointed its guns at Israeli troops has climbed significantly and the Lebanese soldiers now cock their weapons as well.
The IDF has also noticed a radical shift within the LAF top command, which has increased its anti-Israel rhetoric. When this is the spirit of the top command, it is not surprising that mid-level officers, like the company commander who is positioned opposite Misgav Am, ordered his troops to open fire at the IDF on Tuesday.
The LAF today is more than 60 percent Shi’ite. Many of the soldiers openly cooperate with Hizbullah, assisting the terrorist group in hiding its activities and arms caches in southern Lebanon from UNIFIL.
For this reason, Israel is hesitant to transfer intelligence information on Hizbullah positions to UNIFIL, since the peacekeepers need to coordinate their operations with the LAF, which then leaks the information to Hizbullah.
On the other hand, the LAF likely did not expect the situation to escalate so quickly. Tuesday’s first shots were fired from within a group of LAF and UNIFIL soldiers, surrounded by cameramen and journalists. The idea, intelligence analysts in Israel believe, was for the LAF to flex its muscles, to get a picture in the paper of its troops shooting at the Israelis and to create an appearance that it is a serious player in the region.
Where is Hizbullah?
In the meantime it is watching and making sure to stay uninvolved. In his speech on Tuesday night, Hizbullah chief Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah did what he was expected to do and praised the LAF. But Military Intelligence believes that Nasrallah will remain restrained, as he has been in the four years since the Second Lebanon War.
Hizbullah today, with all of its tens of thousands of rockets, is too important to the Iranians to be wasted on a new war with Israel that has no real purpose. It is needed to serve as an Iranian threat for what Israel will face if it decides to attack Iran’s nuclear facilities.
How Israel should respond to the Lebanese aggression was hotly debated in the top levels of the IDF. Some officers pushed for restraint; others believed Israel needed to be more aggressive and since it already knows where all of the LAF positions are in southern Lebanon, perhaps it should have attacked more of them and not just one.
The response chosen was meant to achieve two objectives – to be disproportionate, in the sense that it would cause the LAF severe damage that would deter it from future attacks, but at the same time to not be so disproportionate that it would lead to a larger conflict.
The second objective, judging by the quiet that prevailed along the border by nightfall, seemed to have been met. It will take time to know if the first objective was achieved.
Wednesday, 4 August 2010
Source: The Jerusalem Post - August 4, 2010
One of the first lessons the IDF learned from its failed war against Hizbullah in 2006 was the need to operate within all of the so-called “enclaves” along the Lebanese border.
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On Friday, a Grad-model Katyusha rocket, fired from the Gaza Strip, landed in Ashkelon. On Monday, six Katyusha rockets, fired from Egypt, landed in Eilat and Aqaba, and on Tuesday, clashes on the Israeli-Lebanese border left a senior IDF commander dead.
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August 4, 2010
"An Ominous Scene"
Yesterday witnessed the most serious clash on the border with Lebanon since the 2006 Lebanon war; it lead to the death of one member of the IDF and the wounding of another.
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A bit of background:
The de facto border between Lebanan and Israel, known as the Blue Line, was set in place and sanctioned by the UN in 2000 as the demarcation between Israel and Lebanon: In 2000, Israel called an end to Operation Litani -- an operation of 20 years standing, during which the IDF maintained a presence in southern Lebanon as a bulwark against terrorist attacks into Israel's north by Palestinian Arabs. At that time, the UN certified that Israel was no longer in Lebanese territory when the IDF had pulled south of the Blue Line.
(The history of this line -- presumably going back to 1923 -- is not highly relevent in this context: What matters is that the UN officially sanctioned this as the demarcation between Israel and Lebanon in 2000.)
A fence runs along the border between Israel and Lebanon, but it is not in all areas absolutely contiguous with the Blue Line. In certain areas because of topography (perhaps rocky, hilly terrain), the fence runs south of the Blue Line, inside of Israel. Israel however, has never relinquished claim to the enclaves between the fence and the Blue Line, where it runs north of that fence. In fact, the IDF routinely moves into those enclaves, for maintenance and to consistently clarify the fact of Israeli sovereignty there. Israel's unqualified position is that land south of the Blue Line is Israeli territory.
UNIFIL (the UN Interim Forces in Lebanon) was a presence in Lebanon before 2006. But with the end of the Second Lebanon War and UN Security Council resolution 1701, its numbers were increased and its mandate enhanced: It was to operate between the Blue Line and the Litani River (i.e., in southern Lebanon), essentially at the bidding of/to provide assistance to the Lebanese army, in an effort to prevent Hezbollah from re-arming and operating in southern Lebanon. My readers are well aware of the farce that this has been and we need not visit this issue right here. The essential point is that the UNIFIL is in the area north of the Blue Line and cooperates with the Lebanese army.
What is also of significance here is that when the IDF moves into an enclave between the fence and the Blue Line, it routinely notifies UNIFIL, which apparently routinely notifies the Lebanese army.
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Yesterday began with a routine movement of the IDF into an enclave between the Blue Line and the fence. UNIFIL had been notified of IDF intentions to remove some trees (that were blocking a surveillance camera on a lookout post in a nearby Kibbutz); this was scheduled to begin at 9:00 AM. UNIFIL notified the Lebanese army, and then, on instructions from the army, requested that the IDF delay a couple of hours.
That delay provided time for one or more officers in the Lebanese army to lay an ambush and to invite media. As the IDF entered the area, snipers began to shoot. Bullets aimed at the head of Lt. Col. Dov Harari killed him. A second officer was seriously wounded but has since been moved out of intensive care.
Israel retaliation was swift: shelling of a military vehicle in the Lebanese border town of Adaisseh killed three Lebanese soldiers; one Lebanese journalist was also killed.
Today, the IDF went back to the area and proceeded with the removal of the trees, not only because those trees required removal, but to make the point clear that Israel was within its jurisdiction to operate there.
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Several point are noteworthy with regard to this lethal incident. Perhaps most significant is that this is not terrorist Hezbollah we are speaking of, but the regular Lebanese army. While undoubtedly Hezbollah, which is dominant in the area, knew of what was about to take place, it was not directly involved. The implications are huge.
What is more, the presence of the media speaks to the deliberate premediation of the attack on the IDF.
In a departure from the norm, the UN stands with Israel in this case. UNIFIL, the eyes of the UN in that area, has verified that Israel remained south of the Blue Line in Israeli territory.
The question has been raised, however, as to whether UNIFIL, though not directly complicit, knew about the planned attack and did nothing. The possibility most certainly exists, as, over the years, the UN forces in Lebanon have closed their eyes to a great deal indeed (such as the rearming of Hezbollah by Syria).
The irony is that, amidst considerable controversy about UNIFIL's failure to fulfill its mandate, that mandate was just extended by the Security Council in late July.
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The defense of Lebanon with regard to this incident is that some land below the Blue Line is actually Lebanese territory, and that the IDF had entered Lebanon in defiance of Resolution 1701. They have not a leg to stand on, but Hezbollah and the Lebanese government (which today are one and the same) make claims as it suits them.
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A position of strength from us is imperative at this point.
From Egypt sources comes the charge that the Grad rockets fired at Eilat and Aqaba were fired by an armed Palestinian faction from Gaza, operating in the Sinai.
Speaking at a press conference today, Southern District Police Commander Yohanan Danino said that Eilat has now been placed on the list of areas threatened by terror.
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see my website www.ArlenefromIsrael.info
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