DATE=5/24/2000
TYPE=U-S OPINION ROUNDUP
TITLE=ISRAEL WITHDRAWS FROM SOUTH LEBANON
NUMBER=6-11835
BYLINE=ANDREW GUTHRIE
DATELINE=WASHINGTON
EDITOR=ASSIGNMENTS
TELEPHONE=619-3335
INTERNET=YES
CONTENT=
INTRO: The week's major development in the Middle
East is the end of a 22-year military occupation in
southern Lebanon by Israel and its allied South
Lebanon Army.
The last Israeli troops, in long columns of tanks,
armored personnel carriers, and other vehicles,
crossed the border into Northern Israel under cover of
darkness.
It has been a lot more chaotic than the Israeli
government planned, leaving plenty to comment on for
the U-S daily papers. Here now, with a sample, is
___________ and today's U-S Opinion Roundup.
TEXT: The Israeli government of Prime Minister Ehud
Barak had been promising the withdrawal for months,
and planned to complete it by early July. But when
its ally in the security zone, the Christian militia
known as the South Lebanon Army virtually collapsed as
the Israeli pullout began in earnest, the operation
was hastily speeded up.
As the Israelis and their Lebanese allies left - some
would say fled - guerrillas of the Iranian-supported
Hezbollah force raced into the void. They were
accompanied by thousands of cheering Palestinians,
reclaiming towns and villages, from which they had
mostly fled 22-years ago, after the Israeli incursion.
We begin our sampling of American opinion on all this
in the seaport of Baltimore, where The Sun gives away
its concerns in the headline of its lead editorial:
"Chaos in Lebanon endangers Mideast."
VOICE: Disintegration of Israel's buffer zone
in Lebanon and its satellite south Lebanon Army
of friendly Lebanese Christians - before
negotiation of a peace on Israel's northern
border - threatens wider conflict. It comes as
a direct and unintended consequence of Prime
Minister Ehud Barak's pledge to the Israeli
electorate of a unilateral pullout by July 7th.
Today, Hezbollah terrorists control Lebanon's
side of the border. Their rockets are closer;
their choice of targets wider, their points of
entry more numerous. ... The destabilization and
sudden menace could at least concentrate the
minds of adversaries on the mutual need for
peace between them.
TEXT: In the Midwest, The [Cleveland, Ohio] Plain
Dealer is also concerned about the latest turn of
events.
VOICE: Now, with startling swiftness, fighters
of the Iranian-backed Hezbollah faction have
taken matters into their own hands, driving
hundreds of soldiers of the South Lebanon Army
into exile in Israel, or taking them prisoner.
It is a starling reversal of fortune for
[Israeli Prime Minister Ehud] Barak, who only a
week ago won an important vote in the Israeli
parliament on ceding more territory to the
Palestinians.
TEXT: On New York's Long Island, Newsday feels the
hasty withdrawal has put the Barak government at great
risk unless Syria steps in to bolster the national
Lebanese army.
VOICE: Unless Syria steps in to ensure that the
Lebanese army takes over as much territory as it
can and stabilizes the volatile situation,
Hezbollah militants will fill the vacuum left by
the Israeli withdrawal and pose a significant
threat to Israel itself. Terrorist
provocations, in turn, could precipitate
retaliatory attacks by Israel and reignite the
border conflict. But it is unclear whether
Syria has the will - or, for that matter, the
capacity - to affect Hezbollah's actions the way
it might have a few years ago.
TEXT: The Chicago Tribune, echoes Newsday's thoughts
about the role of the Lebanese National army, which
needs to assert itself, to prevent a worsening
situation.
VOICE: War is never neat, and retreat is never
orderly. But when the smoke clears from
Israel's chaotic troop withdrawal from Lebanon,
the status quo in the Middle East will have
shifted significantly - - and for the better.
...Lebanon's national army, with Syria's
backing, should move in to take control of the
border and prevent any spillover of violence
into northern Israel. ... [Prime Minister] Barak
is now ready to hold Lebanon and Syria
accountable for any attacks on Israel that come
from Lebanon. That is justified.
TEXT: In Texas, The Houston Chronicle worries that
the immediate future is just plain confused.
VOICE: Israel's hastened withdrawal from
southern Lebanon could be a necessary spasm on
the long path to peace in the Middle East, or it
might be the prelude to another chapter of
chronic violence. Given the animosity the
region's enemies feel for one another ... the
odds favor the latter.
TEXT: The Los Angeles Times is also pondering how
Hezbollah will respond to its new situation.
VOICE: Hezbollah is now at the peak of its
popularity and strength, its achievement a
source of pride that cuts across sectarian lines
in Lebanon. The danger is that Hezbollah will
be tempted to claim as a fruit of its victory
the right to turn south Lebanon into its own
fiefdom. Trained and armed by Iran and abetted
by Syria, which has often used the organization
for its own political ends, Hezbollah threatens
to become a permanent armed presence in the
south and a constant menace to northern Israel.
/// OPT /// Israel has repeatedly warned that if
Hezbollah attacks, all of Lebanon and perhaps
even the 30-thousand-man Syrian army in eastern
Lebanon could be exposed to Israeli attacks in
return. There is no reason to doubt that
intention and every reason to fear what it could
lead to. ///END OPT ///
TEXT: The preeminent U-S financial daily, The Wall
Street Journal, makes a historical comparison painful
to many Americans.
VOICE: Critics of Israel's occupation of
southern Lebanon have long compared that policy
to America's ill-fated involvement in Vietnam.
The comparison is especially apt now that
Israel's withdrawal has turned into a rout,
leaving a betrayed ally, a critically endangered
civilian population and a footloose horde of
Hezbollah thugs who have good reason to believe
that their terrorist acts have finally paid off.
...Israel's presence in Lebanon exacted a toll
in lives - some 15-hundred over 18-years ...
But perhaps its heaviest toll was on Israel's
memory, in particular its memory of the constant
attacks it sustained prior to its 1982 invasion.
It had better prepare for a sharp awakening.
TEXT: With that rather somber prophesy, we conclude
this sampling of editorial comment on the sudden, and
somewhat chaotic ending to 22-years of Israeli
military occupation in southern Lebanon.
NEB/ANG/RAE
24-May-2000 14:37 PM EDT (24-May-2000 1837 UTC)
NNNN
Source: Voice of America
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