Al Hayat 22.04.10 Drum beating does not necessarily imply going to war. Sometimes drums are beaten in order to avoid a military conflict; as a chapter of diplomatic and political pressures; and perhaps for crises that are external to the direct arena which is at the center of all interests. We cannot separate the keenness to intensify the “missile crisis” from two files – the first being the open crisis with Iran, whose stance is a source of embarrassment to Russia and China; and the second being that we are still living in the aftermath of the July 2006 War in Lebanon, which introduced some change on the game rules in the Arab-Israeli conflict. Israel was obliged to stop its destructive war in 2006 without being able to deprive Hezbollah from its ability to shower its very heart with missiles. It considered UN SC Resolution 1701 as some kind of sanction against Hezbollah, as it is kept away from the border with Lebanon. It was probably thinking of the coming round, and more specifically of missiles. Consequently, it hastily developed anti-missile methods. However, it is widely believed that anti-missile operations are costly and still lack precision. Since that day, Israel has wondered about its ability to coexist with an arsenal at its border, one that is controlled by a party that dreams of uprooting it – a dream that President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad makes no secret of. During that war, Hezbollah registered a precedent that Arab armies which confronted Israel failed to achieve. In parallel to this success, the Party of God lost its ability to shift the front in South Lebanon. A great change was brought about on the condition of the Resistance. Hezbollah became obliged to use its arsenal if Israel retaliated for any operation realized at the border area by attacking the heart of Lebanon. In other words, any shift at the front carried henceforth the danger of launching war. It is evident for Hezbollah to consider the 2006 war to be a battle in a prolonged conflict, due to the fact that part of the Lebanese territory is still occupied. The Party of God's program goes beyond the Lebanese soil and encompasses its uncompromising commitments towards the Palestinian cause and the feeling of common path and fate with the Islamic Republic in Iran. In practice, Hezbollah entered into an armament race in which resistance movements usually do not take part. It had to start behaving as a quasi-state. The more Israel develops weapons, the more Hezbollah strives to obtain what would confront them or decrease their gravity. This implies seeking weapons that obstruct the control of Israeli fighter planes on the Lebanese air space, and developing the range and precision of the other missiles. This also implies threatening Tel Aviv, Dimona, and other locations, whose mere capacity to be targeted was considered by Israel as a reason to launch a war. Shimon Perez accused Syria of providing Scud missiles to Hezbollah. These allegations were accompanied by threats to return Syria to the “Stone Age”, without any evidence being submitted. When US administration entered into the crisis, it summoned, advised, warned, and didn't offer any evidence that would justify the current “missile crisis”. The current crisis prompts any observer to ask a variety of questions: Should the allegations be considered a response to the tripartite summit that was held in Damascus last February between Assad, Ahmadinejad, and Nasrallah? Does Israel hence mean to obstruct the return of the US ambassador to Damascus and divert attention from its conflict with the Obama administration on the way to seriously stir the peace issue? Do the Israeli declarations, which consider Hezbollah to be a troop of the Syrian army, aim at holding Damascus responsible for the continued ceasefire in South Lebanon and any violation of this ceasefire that could occur? Does this also mean that the region will face an Israeli war against both Syria and Lebanon if Hezbollah tries to retrieve its ability to shift the front or take revenge for Imad Moghnieh? Or does the “missile crisis” aim at offering pretexts for the scenario which considers that “cutting off Iran's arms is less costly than attacking it on its territory”? Drum beating does not necessarily imply going to war. However, it is a very dangerous game in the absence of a reasonable and acceptable US role and in light of the paralyzed Turkish role after Erdogan's stardom led to the breakdown of Ahmed Davutoglu's plane.
