Better Late Than Never

Israel has finally gotten around to fighting the good fight on Hizbullah's rampant and widespread use of residential areas as cover for its rocket attacks into Israel during the 34-day war this past August. Too little, too late. Yet, it's better late than never.

Israel’s military, which has been accused of abuses in its war against Hezbollah this summer, has declassified photographs, video images and prisoner interrogations to buttress its accusation that Hezbollah systematically fired from civilian neighborhoods in southern Lebanon and took cover in those areas to shield itself from attack.

Lebanon and international human rights groups have accused Israel of war crimes in the 34 days of fighting in July and August, saying that Israel fired into populated areas and that civilians accounted for a vast majority of the more than 1,000 Lebanese killed.

Israel says that it tried to avoid civilians, but that Hezbollah fired from civilian areas, itself a war crime, which made those areas legitimate targets.

In a new report, an Israeli research group says Hezbollah stored weapons in mosques, battled Israelis from inside empty schools, flew white flags while transporting missiles and launched rockets near United Nations monitoring posts.

The detailed report on the war was produced by the Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center at the Center for Special Studies, a private research group headed by Reuven Erlich, a retired colonel in military intelligence, who worked closely with the Israeli military.

An advance copy was given to The New York Times by the American Jewish Congress, which has itself fought against the use of “human shields,” provided consultation and translated the study.

In Lebanon, a Hezbollah official denied the study’s allegations, saying its military units were based outside towns and villages and had come into populated areas only when circumstances required it. “We tried to avoid having to fight among civilian areas, but when Israeli troops entered villages, we were automatically forced to fight them from inside these villages to defend it,” said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak on military matters.

How will Hizbullah explain the rockets fired from residential areas? How can they? They'll simply blame Israel for the casualties caused when Israeli counterbattery fire hit civilians along with Hizbullah members.

I'd also suspect that some of the items seen in this report are among those that bloggers uncovered and put online. They include rockets fired from near apartment buildings and trucks speeding through villages to avoid being targeted after launching their deadly cargo only to hide in and among residential and commercial buildings.

Technorati: terrorism, nasrallah, fatah, Gilad, Shalit, Olmert, Abbas, Regev, Goldwasser, PRC, Hamas, Gaza, palestinian, Israel, hizbullah, hezbullah, hezbollah, lebanon, syria