A New War Is Possible in Lebanon

​​A few weeks after it began, the deployment of the German navy off the Lebanese coast as part of the United Nations UNIFIL mission has already caused more controversy than the four-year-old deployment of German troops in the far riskier environment of Afghanistan — at least as far as German public opinion is concerned.

At the same time, the passion with which the debate is being conducted has little relationship to the mission's military relevance. The German naval mission in the Eastern Mediterranean has virtually zero relevance — at least as far as the official mandate is concerned, under which the troops are there to prevent military supplies coming in to Hezbollah via the Lebanese coast.

There never have been any military supplies which have come in using this route. Weapons deliveries have always come (and continue to do so) largely via the eastern land border with Syria. A small amount used to come from Teheran or Damascus by air to Beirut, at least until the war started in mid-July.

The Israeli navy maintained a strict blockade of the Lebanese coast for seven weeks between mid-July and the beginning of September, and they did not intercept a single bullet.

By November 3rd, the UNIFIL fleet, under German command, had already checked over 380 ships via radio. There was not a single case of even suspected arms smuggling, and not one ship had to be boarded.

New developments

The restrictions on movement and activity under which the German navy has been required to operate within Lebanon's six-mile zone were revealed only at the end of October. If it had been true that arms supplies for Hezbollah were likely to be coming in by sea, then these restrictions would indeed have been of considerable significance.

Within this six-mile zone, it would be perfectly possible to organise smuggling from the coast of Syria to the northern coast of Lebanon. And this is still the case despite the Lebanese government's announcement on the occasion of the visit by German defence minister Franz Josef Jung that the six-mile zone had shortly before and without warning been put under the complete control of an international naval force under German command.

The limited scope of control is due to the fact that the area under German command is limited to Zone 4, the coast between the Lebanese-Israeli border and the Litani River (around 20 percent of the entire Lebanese coast). Moreover, the rule continues to apply that ships can be checked only after consulting with the Lebanese authorities.

So a question remains — and it's of no little importance. Was the German government simply careless when it negotiated the terms of engagement and/or careless again when it failed to inform parliament? Or did the government "break its promise" and deliberately "deceive" and "lie" to the parliament, as some in the opposition maintain.

Ceasefire at risk

But much graver in international terms are the repeated incidents of threatening behaviour towards German ships and helicopters by the Israeli air force.

The form of words which has been found in Jerusalem, and which seems to have been accepted by the German government, is that these incidents are "misunderstandings". This is an explanation which is scarcely credible.

Is it possible that the planes of the Israeli air force, equipped with the most modern radar, information electronics and communication technology, are really unable to identify a clearly identified German ship equipped with the same technology at a distance of several kilometres? If that's the case, then German naval troops are in such danger that they need to be withdrawn immediately.

Instead of trivialising and excusing the Israeli air force trial of strength as "misunderstandings", the German government should be condemning it as a part of a strategy of escalation. This strategy could well lead to the ending of the ceasefire with Hezbollah which has been in force since mid-August, and to a resumption of war.

Violating UN Resolution 1701

This strategy of escalation consists mainly of repeatedly violating the airspace over Lebanese territory. According to UNIFIL, Israeli fighters and reconnaissance aircraft entered Lebanese airspace sometimes between nine and fifteen times a day during October. That is a clear violation of Security Council Resolution 1701.

The Israeli government justifies these violations of international law by its air force by arguing that UNIFIL is not carrying out (or at least not carrying out adequately) its task of disarming the Hezbollah militias.

But this attempt at justification is unacceptable in international legal, political and military operational terms. The governments of Germany and the other countries involved in UNIFIL should unmistakably reject this argument.

For one thing, the UN Resolution 1701 doesn't include any mandate to disarm Hezbollah. But even if it did, and the UNIFIL was failing to fulfil it adequately or at all, it still wouldn't give Israel the right to take unilateral military action.

Hezbollah provoked

Aside from that, low flying manoeuvres and mock attacks on supposed Hezbollah strongholds, such as those which Israeli fighters carried out on October 31st over Beirut and two other cities in southern Lebanon, were not designed to stop the arms smuggling which, according to UNIFIL's observations, takes place over the open border to Syria.

These manoeuvres and mock attacks were evidently intended to provoke Hezbollah to fire its rockets. Such action would then serve as a pretext for the Israelis to attack ground targets in Lebanon once more.

That would put a final end to the ceasefire of August 14th, and it would mean the failure of the most important aspect of UNIFIL's mission.

Andreas Zumach

© Qantara.de 2006

Translated from the German by Michael Lawton and Jennifer Taylor-Gaida

Andreas Zumach is the diplomatic correspondent of Germany's daily, Die Tageszeitung, at the UN in Geneva, Switzerland.

Qantara.de

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