Israeli Troops Criticize War Handling

Israeli soldiers returning from the war in Lebanon say the army was slow to rescue wounded comrades and suffered from a lack of supplies so dire that they had to drink water from the canteens of dead Hezbollah guerrillas. "We fought for nothing. We cleared houses that will be reoccupied in no time," said Ilia Marshak, a 22-year-old infantryman who spent a week in Lebanon.

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  thanks to Huffington Post

War Stirs Worry in Israel Over State of Military

Sgt. Lior Rahamin's Israeli reserve unit had not trained in two years. When its members were called up for the Lebanon war, they didn't have straps for their guns, spare ammunition, flak jackets or more than one good radio. There were other shortages: Twice their operations were canceled because they had no water to take; once they went two days without food. "Hezbollah didn't surprise us. We were surprised by the Israel Defense Forces," said Rahamin, 30, a paratrooper who was wounded fighting in Lebanon in 1997 and who volunteered to go with his unit again. The next time they call, he said, "we will not show up."

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  thanks to Drudge Report

The 155th Victim
Where are the Achievements of This War?
by Uri Avnery

All over Israel, they are already talking about the "Next Round", the war that will at long last eliminate Hizbullah and punish it for besmirching our honor. That has become, so it seems, a self-evident matter. Even Haaretz treats it as such in its editorials. In the South, they don't speak about the "Next Round" because the present round is endless. To have any value whatsoever, the investigation must expose the real roots of the war and present the public with the historic choice that has become clear in this war, too: Either the settlements and an endless war, or the return of the occupied territories and peace. Otherwise, the investigation will only provide more backing for the outlook of the Right, to wit: we only have to expose the mistakes that have been made and correct them, then we can start the next war and win.

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Israel: a State built on lies

The outcome of Israeli military's own inquiry into Qana II was to Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International something far from the truth. HRW said that the massacre of at least 28 Lebanese – mostly children and women -- on July 30 was the "latest product" of Israel's indiscriminating bombing. Amnesty added that Israel had a history of either not investigating civilian deaths or conducting flawed inquiries. It was the same excuse this time as the one Israel offered for the horrific killing of 106 Lebanese refugees and four UN soldiers by artillery fire on a UNIFIL compound at the same village of Qana in Lebanon ten years ago. On both occasions, Israel did not know there were civilians at the targeted points. So pretended Israel's leaders. And they claimed that they were aiming only at Hezbollah each time. Where was Hezbollah? Among so many dead there was not one Hezbollah body nor any relic of its equipment either in 1996 or in 2006.

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