Myths
and Facts - Lebanon
MYTH
“Israel cannot claim that its 1982 invasion of Lebanon, launched against
an ill-equipped PLO, was a defensive war.”
FACT
By June 1982, when the IDF went into Lebanon, the PLO had made life in
northern Israel intolerable, by its repeated shelling of Israeli towns.
A force of some 15-18,000 PLO members was encamped in scores of
locations in Lebanon. About 5,000-6,000 were foreign mercenaries, coming
from such countries as Libya, Iraq, India, Sri Lanka, Chad and
Mozambique.1 Israel discovered enough light arms and other weapons in
Lebanon to equip five brigades.2 The PLO had an arsenal that included
mortars, Katyusha rockets, and an extensive anti-aircraft network. The
PLO also brought hundreds of T-34 tanks into the area.3 Syria, which
permitted Lebanon to become a haven for the PLO and other terrorist
groups, brought surface-to-air missiles into that country, creating yet
another danger for Israel.
Israeli strikes and commando raids had been unable to stem the growth of
this PLO army. Israel was not prepared to wait for more deadly attacks
to be launched against its civilian population before acting against the
terrorists.
MYTH
“The PLO posed no real threat to Israel. When Israel attacked, the PLO
had been observing a year-long cease-fire agreement.”
FACT
The PLO had repeatedly violated the July 1981 cease-fire agreement. In
the ensuing 11 months, the PLO staged 270 terrorist actions in Israel,
the West Bank and Gaza, and along the Lebanese and Jordanian borders.
Twenty-nine Israelis died, and more than 300 were injured in the
attacks.4 The situation in the Galilee became intolerable as the
frequency of attacks forced thousands of residents to flee their homes
or to spend large amounts of time in bomb shelters. During this period,
Israel launched retaliatory raids against PLO bases in Lebanon.
After Israel launched one such assault on June 4-5, 1982, the PLO
responded with a massive artillery and mortar attack on the Israeli
population of the Galilee. On June 6, the IDF moved into Lebanon to
drive out the terrorists.
Former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger defended the Israeli
operation: "No sovereign state can tolerate indefinitely the buildup
along its borders of a military force dedicated to its destruction and
implementing its objectives by periodic shellings and raids."5
"On Lebanon, it is clear that we and Israel both seek an end to the
violence there, and a sovereign, independent Lebanon," President Reagan
said June 21, 1982. "We agree that Israel must not be subjected to
violence from the north."
Documents found by the IDF in Lebanon during the operation showed that
terrorist groups had made detailed plans for shelling towns in northern
Israel. The following are translations of two documents found at PLO
headquarters in Sidon. Both were dated July 1981:
Name of Shelled Target: Kiryat Shemona
Number of Salvos: 17 shells in 2 portions, each portion 120mm
Unit in Charge: Artillery of the Joint Forces of the South.
To: El-Haj Ismail
Greetings for the Revolution!
The Supreme Military Council has decided to concentrate on the
destruction of Kiryat Shemona, Metullah, Dan, Shear Yashuv and Nahariya
and its vicinity.
Kiryat Shemona: will be distributed among all the platoons and will be
shelled with improved "Grad" shells.
Metullah: will be shelled with 160mm mortars (Palestine Liberation
Front-As-Saiqa).
Nahariya and its vicinity will be shelled with 130mm guns-Artillery
Battalion 1
Dan and Shear Yashuv: will be the responsibility of the eastern sector.
Revolution until victory!6
MYTH
“The PLO treated the Lebanese with dignity and respect.”
FACT
For Arab residents of south Lebanon, PLO rule was a nightmare. After the
PLO was expelled from Jordan by King Hussein in 1970, many of its cadres
went to Lebanon. The PLO seized whole areas of the country, where it
brutalized the population and usurped Lebanese government authority.
On October 14, 1976, Lebanese Ambassador Edward Ghorra told the UN
General Assembly the PLO was bringing ruin upon his country:
“Palestinian elements belonging to various splinter organizations
resorted to kidnaping Lebanese, and sometimes foreigners, holding them
prisoners, questioning them, and even sometimes killing them.”6a
Columnists Rowland Evans and Robert Novak, not known for being
sympathetic toward Israel, declared after touring south Lebanon and
Beirut that the facts "tend to support Israel's claim that the PLO has
become permeated by thugs and adventurers."6b
The columnists talked to a doctor whose farm had been taken over without
compensation by the PLO, and turned into a military depot. "You ask how
do we like the Israelis," he said. "Compared to the hell we have had in
Lebanon, the Israelis are brothers." Other Lebanese — Christian and
Muslim alike — gave similar accounts.
Countless Lebanese told harrowing tales of rape, mutilation and murders
committed by PLO forces. The PLO "killed people and threw their corpses
in the courtyards. Some of them were mutilated and their limbs were cut
off. We did not go out for fear that we might end up like them," said
two Arab women from Sidon. "We did not dare go to the beach, because
they molested us, weapons in hand." The women spoke of an incident,
which occurred shortly before the Israeli invasion, in which PLO men
raped and murdered a woman, dumping her body near a famous statue. A
picture of the victim's mangled corpse had been printed in a local
newspaper.7
Dr. Khalil Torbey, a distinguished Lebanese surgeon, told an American
journalist that he was "frequently called in the middle of the night to
attend victims of PLO torture. I treated men whose testicles had been
cut off in torture sessions. The victims, more often than not,
were...Muslims. I saw men — live men — dragged through the streets by
fast-moving cars to which they were tied by their feet."8
New York Times correspondent David Shipler visited Damour, a Christian
village near Beirut, which had been occupied by the PLO since 1976, when
Palestinians and Lebanese leftists sacked the city and massacred
hundreds of its inhabitants. The PLO, Shipler wrote, had turned the town
into a military base, "using its churches as strongholds and armories"
(New York Times, June 21, 1982).
When the IDF drove the PLO out of Damour in June 1982, Prime Minister
Menachem Begin announced that the town's Christian residents could come
home and rebuild. Returning villagers found their former homes littered
with spray-painted Palestinian nationalist slogans, Fatah literature and
posters of Yasser Arafat. They told Shipler how happy they were that
Israel had liberated them.9
MYTH
“Israel's operation to end the PLO threats to northern Israel resulted
in 10,000 deaths and 600,000 homeless in south Lebanon.”
FACT
"It is clear to anyone who has traveled in southern Lebanon, as have
many journalists and relief workers, that the original figures of 10,000
dead and 600,000 homeless...were extreme exaggerations," wrote the New
York Times' David Shipler, a sharp critic of the Israeli war effort.10
The 600,000 homeless figure originated in mid-June 1982 with the
Palestine Red Crescent, headed by Yasser Arafat's brother Fathi.
Francesco Noseda of the International Committee of the Red Cross, who
had originally used the bogus number, later repudiated it.11
Of course, there would have been zero dead or homeless if the PLO hadn't
used south Lebanon as a base from which to menace Israel.
MYTH
“The PLO was willing to leave Beirut in the summer of 1982 to save the
civilian population from further attack, but Israel made this
impossible.”
FACT
For more than a month, the PLO proved itself intransigent, trying to
extract a political victory from its military defeat. Arafat declared
his willingness "in principle" to leave Beirut, then refused to go to
any other country. Throughout the siege, the PLO hid behind innocent
civilians, calculating that if Israel were to attack, it would be
internationally condemned. That is precisely what happened.
By mid-June, Israeli troops had surrounded 6,000-9,000 terrorists who
had taken up positions amid the civilian population of West Beirut. To
prevent civilian casualties, Israel agreed to a ceasefire to enable an
American diplomat, Ambassador Philip Habib, to mediate a peaceful PLO
withdrawal from Lebanon. As a gesture of flexibility, Israel agreed to
permit PLO forces to leave Beirut with their personal weapons.12 But the
PLO continued to make new demands.
For weeks, the PLO talked about withdrawal, while attaching conditions
that made it impossible. The PLO adopted a strategy of controlled
violations of the cease-fire, with the purpose of inflicting casualties
on Israel and provoking Israeli retaliation sufficient to get the IDF
blamed for disrupting the negotiations and harming civilians.
"The Israelis bombed buildings, innocent looking on the outside, where
their intelligence told them that PLO offices were hidden," wrote Middle
East analyst Joshua Muravchik. "Their intelligence also told them of the
huge network of underground PLO storage facilities for arms and
munitions that was later uncovered by the Lebanese Army. No doubt the
Israelis dropped some bombs hoping to penetrate those facilities and
detonate the dumps. The PLO had both artillery and anti-aircraft
[equipment] truck mounted. These would fire at the Israelis and then
move."13 The Israelis would fire back and sometimes miss, inadvertently
hitting civilian targets.
In numerous instances, the media mistakenly reported that Israel was
hitting civilian targets in areas where no military ones were nearby. On
one night in July, Israeli shells hit seven embassies in Beirut. NBC
aired a report that appeared to lend credence to PLO claims it had no
military positions in the area. Israel, Muravchik noted, "soon released
reconnaissance photos showing the embassy area honeycombed with tanks,
mortars, heavy machine guns and anti-aircraft positions."14
MYTH
“Israel was responsible for the massacre of thousands of innocent
Palestinian refugees at Sabra and Shatila.”
FACT
The Lebanese Christian Phalangist militia was responsible for the
massacres that occurred at the two Beirut-area refugee camps on
September 16-17, 1982. Israeli troops allowed the Phalangists to enter
Sabra and Shatila to root out terrorist cells believed located there. It
had been estimated that there may have been up to 200 armed men in the
camps working out of the countless bunkers built by the PLO over the
years, and stocked with generous reserves of ammunition.15
When Israeli soldiers ordered the Phalangists out, they found hundreds
dead (estimates range from 460 according to the Lebanese police, to
700-800 calculated by Israeli intelligence). The dead, according to the
Lebanese account, included 35 women and children. The rest were men:
Palestinians, Lebanese, Pakistanis, Iranians, Syrians and Algerians.16
The killings were perpetrated to avenge the murders of Lebanese
President Bashir Gemayel and 25 of his followers, killed in a bomb
attack earlier that week.17
Israel had allowed the Phalange to enter the camps as part of a plan to
transfer authority to the Lebanese, and accepted responsibility for that
decision. The Kahan Commission of Inquiry, formed by the Israeli
government in response to public outrage and grief, found that Israel
was indirectly responsible for not anticipating the possibility of
Phalangist violence. Israel instituted the panel's recommendations,
Defense Minister Ariel Sharon resigned and Gen. Raful Eitan, the Army
Chief of Staff was dismissed.
The Kahan Commission, declared former Secretary of State Henry
Kissinger, was "a great tribute to Israeli democracy....There are very
few governments in the world that one can imagine making such a public
investigation of such a difficult and shameful episode."18
Recently, efforts have been made in Belgium to try Sharon for his role
in what happened in Lebanon. The appellate court there, however, threw
out the case.[fn Radio Free Europe/Radio Free Liberty, (June 26, 2002).]
The European campaign appears designed to smear Israel in general, and
Sharon in particular, and is particularly odious given that Israel's own
democratic judicial institutions already dealt with this tragedy.
Ironically, while 300,000 Israelis demonstrated in Israel to protest the
killings, little or no reaction occurred in the Arab world. Outside the
Middle East, a major international outcry against Israel erupted over
the massacres. The Phalangists, who perpetrated the crime, were spared
the brunt of the condemnations for it.
By contrast, few voices were raised in May 1985, when Muslim militiamen
attacked the Shatila and Burj-el Barajneh Palestinian refugee camps.
According to UN officials, 635 were killed and 2,500 wounded. During a
two-year battle between the Syrian-backed Shiite Amal militia and the
PLO, more than 2,000 people, including many civilians, were reportedly
killed. No outcry was directed at the PLO or the Syrians and their
allies over the slaughter. International reaction was also muted in
October 1990 when Syrian forces overran Christian-controlled areas of
Lebanon. In the eight-hour clash, 700 Christians were killed — the worst
single battle of Lebanon's Civil War.19 These killings came on top of an
estimated 95,000 deaths that had occurred during the civil war in
Lebanon from 1975-1982.19a
MYTH
“Israel's 1978 and 1982 invasions of Lebanon proved its aggressive
intentions.”
FACT
Israel has long sought a peaceful northern border. But Lebanon's
position as a haven for terrorist groups has made this impossible. In
March 1978, PLO terrorists infiltrated Israel. After murdering an
American tourist walking near an Israeli beach, they hijacked a civilian
bus. When Israeli troops intercepted the bus, the terrorists opened
fire. A total of 34 hostages died in the attack. In response, Israeli
forces crossed into Lebanon and overran terrorist bases in the southern
part of that country, pushing the terrorists away from the border. The
IDF withdrew after two months, allowing UN forces to enter. But UN
troops were unable to prevent terrorists from reinfiltrating the region
and introducing new, more dangerous arms. It was this buildup that led
to Israel's 1982 invasion.
Jerusalem repeatedly stressed that Israel did not covet a single inch of
Lebanese territory. Israel's 1985 withdrawal from Lebanon confirmed
that. The small 1,000-man Israeli force, deployed in a strip of
territory extending eight miles into south Lebanon, protected towns and
villages in northern Israel from attack. Israel also repeatedly said it
would completely withdraw from Lebanon in return for a stable security
situation on its northern border.
Israel pulled all its troops out of southern Lebanon on May 24, 2000,
ending a 22-year military presence there. The Israeli withdrawal was
conducted in coordination with the UN, and, according to the UN,
constituted Israeli fulfillment of its obligations under Security
Council Resolution 425 (1978).
Israel hoped the Lebanese government would subsequently deploy its army
along the southern border to disarm terrorists and maintain order, but
this has not occurred, despite criticism from the United States, the UN
and Israel.20 “From a point northward, we make the rules,” said Lebanese
Defense Minister Khalil Hrawi, “and from a certain point on in the
south, there is no presence of the armed forces, and the Hizballah
coordinates their actions with themselves."21 Thus, Hizballah continues
to enjoy free reign and threaten Israel's northern border.
MYTH
“Israel still has not satisfied the UN's requirements to withdraw
completely from Lebanon because of its illegal occupation of Shebaa
Farms.”
FACT
Despite the UN ruling that Israel completed its withdrawal from southern
Lebanon,22 Hizballah and the Lebanese government insist that Israel
still holds Lebanese territory in eastern Mount Dov, a 100-square-mile,
largely uninhabited patch called Shebaa Farms. This claim provides
Hizballah with a pretext to continue its activities against Israel.
Thus, after kidnapping three Israeli soldiers in that area, it announced
that they were captured on Lebanese soil.
Israel, which has built a series of observation posts on strategic
hilltops in the area, maintains that the land was captured from Syria;
nevertheless, the Syrians have supported Hizballah's claim. According to
the Washington Post, the controversy benefits each of the Arab parties.
"For Syria, it means Hizballah can still be used to keep the Israelis
off balance; for Lebanon, it provides a way to apply pressure over
issues, like the return of Lebanese prisoners still held in Israeli
jails. For Hezbollah, it is a reason to keep its militia armed and
active, providing a ready new goal for a resistance movement that
otherwise had nothing left to resist."23
In January 2005, the UN Security Council adopted a resolution condemning
violence along the Israel-Lebanon border and reasserted that the
Lebanese claim tothe Shebaa farms area is “not compatible with Security
Council resolutions.”
“If they go from Sheba'a, we will not stop fighting them. Our goal is to
liberate the 1948 borders of Palestine...[Jews] can go back to Germany
or wherever they came from.”
— Hezbollah spokesperson Hassan Ezzedin23a
MYTH
“Israel launched an unprovoked attack on UN peacekeeping forces in
Lebanon.”
FACT
In April 1995, the IDF mounted "Operation Grapes of Wrath" to halt
Hizballah's bombardment of Israel's northern frontier. During the
operation, Israeli artillery mistakenly hit a UN base in Kafr Kana,
killing nearly 100 civilians. Afterward, a Joint Monitoring Machinery,
including American, French, Syrian and Lebanese representatives, was
created to prohibit unprovoked attacks on civilian populations and the
use of civilians as shields for terrorist activities.
MYTH
“Syria has been a force for stability and good in Lebanon. It has always
respected Lebanon's sovereignty and independence.”
FACT
Damascus has a long and bloody history of intervention in Lebanon, and
has made no secret of its hope to make its weaker neighbor part of
Syria. Since the creation of contemporary Lebanon in 1920, "most Syrians
have never accepted modern Lebanon as a sovereign and independent
state."24 The outbreak of the Lebanese Civil War in 1975 gave Damascus
the opportunity to act on its belief that Lebanon and Syria are one.
In 1976, Syria intervened in the Lebanese civil war on behalf of
Lebanese Christians. By 1978, Damascus had switched sides, and was
supporting a leftist coalition of Palestinians, Druze and Muslims
against the Christians. Eventually, Syrian troops occupied two-thirds of
Lebanon. Syria's deployment of surface-to-air missile batteries in
Lebanon, and its policy of allowing the PLO and other terrorist groups
to attack Israel from there, helped trigger the 1982 Lebanon War.25
During the first week of Israel's "Operation Peace for Galilee," in June
1982, Syrian troops engaged in battles with Israeli forces. The Israelis
destroyed or damaged 18 of the 19 Syrian missile batteries and, in one
day, shot down 29 Syrian MiG fighters without the loss of a single
plane. Syria and Israel carefully avoided confrontations for the
remainder of the war.
Nevertheless, Syria found other ways to hurt Israel. In 1982, Syrian
agents murdered President-elect Bashir Gemayel, who wanted peace with
Israel. Two years later, Syria forced President Amin Gemayel, Bashir's
brother, to renege on a peace treaty he signed with Israel a year
earlier.26
Syria's activities were aimed not only at Israel, but also at the West.
In April 1983, Hizballah terrorists, operating from Syrian-controlled
territory, bombed the U.S. embassy in Beirut, killing 49 and wounding
120. Six months later, Hizballah terrorists drove two trucks carrying
explosives into the U.S. Marine and French military barracks near
Beirut, killing 241 Americans and 56 French soldiers.
In 1985, Hizballah operatives began kidnapping Westerners off the
streets of Beirut and other Lebanese cities. From the beginning, it was
clear the Syrians and their Iranian collaborators could order the
release of the Western hostages at any time. For example, when a
Frenchman was kidnapped in August 1991, the Syrians demanded that he be
freed. Within days, he was. Most of the hostages were held in the Bekaa
Valley or the suburbs of Beirut. Both areas were controlled by Syria.
From 1985-88, Amal Shiite militiamen, closely aligned with Syria, killed
hundreds of Palestinian civilians in attacks on refugee camps.
In October 1990, with the West's attention focused on Kuwait, Syrian
troops stormed the Beirut stronghold of Christian insurgent Gen. Michel
Aoun. Besides battle deaths, approximately 700 people were massacred.27
With that blitzkrieg, Damascus wiped out the only remaining threat to
its hegemony in Lebanon.
On May 22, 1991, Lebanese President Elias Hrawi traveled to Damascus to
sign a "Treaty of Brotherhood, Cooperation and Coordination" with Syrian
President Hafez Assad. The agreement states that Syria will ensure
Lebanon's "sovereignty and independence," even though Damascus is being
allowed to keep its occupation army in that country.
A hint of Syria's real intentions came from Defense Minister Mustafa
Tlas several weeks before the treaty's signing. Tlas predicted that
unity would be achieved between the two countries "soon, or at least in
our generation."28
Since signing the treaty, Syria has kept a tight grip on Lebanon and
ruthlessly suppressed challenges to its domination.
MYTH
“Syria has done everything possible to prevent terrorists in Lebanon
from threatening regional peace.”
FACT
Hizballah receives financial support and arms from Iran, usually via
Damascus. Hizballah — which had initially confined itself to launching
Katyusha rocket attacks on northern Israel and ambushing Israeli troops
in the security zone — has in recent years stepped up its attacks on
Israeli civilians.
The Syrian-backed Lebanese Army has yet to take action against
Hizballah, or other terrorist organizations, such as the Popular Front
for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), Popular Front for the Liberation
of Palestine-General Command (PFLP-GC) or Democratic Front for the
Liberation of Palestine (DFLP), which have bases in the
Syrian-controlled Bekaa Valley in eastern Lebanon.
In fact, Syria has given its unqualified support for these
organizations. Syria uses these terrorists as surrogates to maintain a
level of violence against Israel and put pressure on the Israelis to
negotiate over the Golan Heights. Asked about his support for terrorist
organizations like Hizballah, Hafez Assad responded that they were
really "patriots and militants who fight for the liberty and
independence of their country...such people cannot be called
terrorists."29
MYTH
“Syria intervened in Lebanon only because it was asked to do so by the
Arab League.”
FACT
Syria moved troops into Lebanon before receiving the Arab League's
approval. Damascus intervened in April 1976 after Lebanese Druze warlord
Kemal Jumblatt refused Syrian President Hafez Assad's demand for a
cease-fire in the war. Jumblatt's refusal to stop his forces' attacks
upon Lebanese Christians gave Assad the pretext he needed to intervene.
In June 1976, the Arab League Secretariat convened a meeting at which
Syria, Libya, Saudi Arabia and the Sudan agreed to send troops to
"enforce peace." Assad sent more Syrian troops into the country, while
the others sent only token forces.30 The Arab League's "endorsement," in
short, constituted nothing more than the recognition of a fait accompli.
MYTH
“The Syrians and Lebanese have treated captured Israeli soldiers well
and allowed the Red Cross to visit them.”
FACT
Lebanon and Syria have routinely mistreated Israeli soldiers they have
captured. It is difficult for Israel to obtain any information about its
soldiers and the Lebanese and Syrians usually have denied permission for
the Red Cross to visit the POWs. In addition, even the bodies of
Israelis who have been killed are often held hostage in an effort to use
them as bargaining chips. For example, in September 1991, Israel
released nearly 100 Lebanese Shiite prisoners in exchange for the
remains of four Israeli soldiers killed in Lebanon.
Pilot Ron Arad crashed in 1986 and was captured by Shiite terrorists.
Israel has offered to release hundreds of Lebanese prisoners in exchange
for information about Arad, but Hizballah has refused to cooperate and
Arad has been considered an MIA ever since.
On October 7, 2000, three Israeli soldiers — Sgt. Adi Avitan, Staff Sgt.
Benyamin Avraham and Staff Sgt. Omar Sawaid — were abducted by
Hizballah. They were captured while patrolling the southern (Israeli)
side of the Israeli-Lebanese border. On October 16, Hizballah Secretary
General announced that his organization was holding an Israeli citizen,
Elhanan Tenenboim, who was believed to have been kidnapped while on a
private business trip to Europe.
The four Israelis were held incommunicado by Hizballah. The captors
denied the International Committee of the Red Cross and other parties
permission to visit them. On November 1, 2001, based on new
intelligence, Israeli army rabbi Israel Weiss pronounced the soldiers
dead. In January 2004, in exchange for the return of their soldiers'
remains, Israel agreed to release a group of prisoners and detainees and
hand over the bodies of 60 members of Hizballah. As part of the deal,
Tenenboim was released unharmed and allowed to return to Israel.31
MYTH
“Israel's kidnaping of Sheikh Abdul Karim Obeid in 1989 prolonged the
hostage crisis. It also caused the death of Lt. Col. William Higgins, a
hostage who was later executed by his captors in retaliation.”
FACT
Lt. Col. William Higgins, a Marine who was serving as part of the UN
peacekeeping force in Lebanon, was kidnapped and murdered by the
Lebanese Shiite terrorist group Hizballah. Iran and Syria, countries
that give sanctuary to the terrorists, were also culpable.
"We should be careful to remember that it was not the United States
which caused the killing. It was not Israel," said Amb. Paul Bremer,
former head of the State Department's Counterterrorism office. "It was a
group of murderers in south Lebanon."32
The seizure of Sheik Obeid, who is believed responsible for abducting
several of Israel's soldiers, should not be compared with terrorists
kidnapping innocent civilians and a member of the UN peacekeeping force.
Israel saw Obeid as its only leverage to get its POWs back. Ultimately,
Obeid did help free Israelis, as he was part of the prisoner exchange in
2004 that freed Elhanan Tenenboim and gained the release of the bodies
of three Israeli soldiers murdered in Lebanon by Hizballah.
MYTH
“Israeli attacks against Lebanon demonstrate Israel's aggression and
determination to hold onto Lebanese territory.”
FACT
The United Nations verified that Israel fulfilled its obligation to
withdraw from Lebanon; however, Hizballah, armed with a great assortment
of weapons, and deployed along the international border, has repeatedly
attacked Israeli targets, ambushed and kidnapped soldiers and harassed
Jewish villagers in northern Israel with the aim of provoking an
escalation in hostilities.
Israel has repeatedly requested, with the backing of the UN and United
States, that Lebanon deploy its army in the south and disarm the
guerrillas. Given that Syria effectively controls Lebanon, Israel holds
both governments responsible for the failure to prevent Hizballah's
provocations. Their failure to do so has forced Israel to take
preemptive and retaliatory measures to protect its citizens and
soldiers.
Notes
1Jillian Becker, The PLO, (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1984), pp.
202, 279.
2Jerusalem Post, (June 28, 1982).
3Raphael Israeli. Ed., PLO in Lebanon, (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson,
1983), p. 7.
4Becker, p. 205.
5Washington Post, (June 16, 1982).
6Israeli, pp. 26-28.
6aquoted in Israeli, p. 259. See also New York Times, (October 15,
1976); Official Records of the General Assembly, Thirty-first Session,
Plenary Meetings, 32nd meeting.
6bWashington Post, (June 25, 1982).
7Interview with Israel Television, (July 23, 1982).
8Los Angeles Herald-Examiner, (July 13, 1982), cited in Becker, p. 153.
9New York Times, (June 21, 1982).
10New York Times, (July 14, 1982).
11Washington Post, (June 25, 1982).
12New York Times, (July 3, 1982).
13Joshua Muravchik, "Misreporting Lebanon," Policy Review, (Winter
1983), p. 60.
14Muravchik, p. 60.
15Zeev Schiff and Ehud Yaari, Israel's Lebanon War, (NY: Simon and
Schuster, 1984), p. 70.
16Becker, p. 212.
17Schiff and Yaari, p. 257.
18Washington Post, (February 8, 1983).
19New York Times, (October 19, 1990).
19aBecker, p. 212.
20Washington Post, (January 30, 2001).
21Washington Post, (January 30, 2001).
22"Security Council Endorses Secretary-General’s Conclusion on Israeli
Withdrawal from Lebanon as of 16 June," UN Press Release, (June 18,
2000).
23Washington Post, (January 30, 2001).
23aNew Yorker, (October 14, 2002).
24Daniel Pipes, Damascus Courts The West, (DC: The Washington Institute
for Near East Policy, 1991), p. 26.
25Becker, pp. 204-205.
26Patrick Seale, Asad, (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988),
p. 417.
27Pipes, p. 27.
28al-Hayat, (May 9, 1991).
29Al-Baath, (February 18, 1992); Washington Post, (July 31, 1991).
30Becker, p. 131.
31Israeli Foreign Ministry
32Near East Report, (August 7, 1989).
From:
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/myths/mf11.html
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