Air Strikes Against the #IslamicState

The Law of Futility

By Binoy Kampmark

War is a dirty, unforgiving business.  It is not rendered clean by remote deployments and orders executed at a distance from seemingly safe areas.  It takes lives, inflicts unspeakable harm, and rarely brings smiles to those who suffer it. But the members of the US-led coalition currently involved in striking Islamic State targets in Syria and Iraq would have you think otherwise.  They give the impression that clean distances are golden, and air strikes will have their intended “degrading” effect.  Therein lies the message about the false salvation of machinery – the technological panacea that rarely does what it is meant to.

The notion that air power would win the day has been something of a fetish for enthusiasts, both of the prophetic and practising sort.  It prophetically concerned H. G. Wells in The War in the Air(1908).  It enraptured Britain’s blood lusting Air Marshal Arthur “Bomber” Harris during World War II, who believed in characteristically delusional fashion that his death sowing fleets won the war in exclusive fashion.  Curtis “Demon” Le May fronted as the US equivalent, instrumental behind the striking of sixty-four Japanese cities between March and August 1945 that killed around 330,000 people.  The doctrinal holy water, however, came from the font of the US Strategic Bombing Survey.

Israel - Lebanon’s Government - Hezbollah - Air Strikes

On the Brink of Another War? 

Israel To Hold Lebanon’s Government “Responsible” 

if Hezbollah Retaliates over Air Strikes

By Timothy Alexander Guzman

Israel has warned the Lebanese government that it would be held responsible for any retaliation by Hezbollah after this past Monday’s airstrike by the Israeli Air Force that struck areas held by Hezbollah near the Lebanese-Syria border.  The Washington Post reported that “Hezbollah said it would ” choose the right time and place and the proper way to respond.” Israel is prepared to strike targets in Lebanon associated with Hezbollah strongholds. “An unspecified number of Hezbollah militants were killed in the airstrike, according to pan-Arab news channel Al Arabiya”  the Jerusalem Post said in their report which also stated Israel’s position on the matter:

Israel sent a warning to the Lebanese government in Beirut by way of UNIFIL that it would be held responsible for any attacks by Hezbollah that are launched from Lebanese soil, reported al-Akhbar News Agency on Friday

The Israeli Air Force recently launched strikes that hit Hezbollah targets on the border between Syria and Lebanon claiming that they were preventing missiles from reaching Hezbollah coming from Syria.  The Washington Post quoted Maj. Gen. Eyal Ben-Reuven on Monday’s actions undertaken by the Israeli government as he said “Israel has to act in order to prevent the transfer of game-changing weapons,” said retired Maj. Gen. Eyal Ben-Reuven, speaking from northern Israel. “Although I can’t confirm what happened . . . it is very clear that we are trying to prevent this.”

The Washington Post also quoted Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s comment on the military strike when he said “We will do all that is necessary to defend our citizens.” Hezbollah disagreed with the Lebanese media claiming that the strike targeted “a missile storage center and killed at least four Hezbollah fighters” Hezbollah said that the site “was only partially damaged” according to the report which also confirmed that a Lebanese intelligence official said that “the strike did target a shipment of missiles that had crossed the border from Syria.”

Tensions are rising on the border between Israel and Lebanon since the Syrian civil war began in 2011. Israel has been in preparation to counter Hezbollah in Lebanon and the Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza since both groups are on their borders. “It is self-evident that we see Lebanon as responsible for any attack on Israel from the territory of Lebanon,” Strategic Affairs Minister Yuval Steinitz told Israel radio “It is the duty of the Lebanese government to prevent any terrorist attack – whether a terrorist or missile attack, or any other kind – on the State of Israel,” the Jerusalem Post stated.  Israel violated another UN resolution as “Foreign Minister Gebran Bassil condemned the Israeli strikes saying that Israel was in violation of UN Security Council Resolution 1701 that ended the 2006 Second Lebanon War, according to the Lebanese news outlet” the report said. The Brookings Institute issued a Report in 2011 called ‘The Next War: How another Conflict between Hizballah and Israel Could Look and How