Was Israel invasion of Lebanon planned?

The Guardian (here) reports on the circumstances of the Israeli invasion of Lebanon and the fact that it has nothing to do with Hizbullah capturing 2 Israeli soldiers. Interesting!

A little summary of the article:
"The assault on Lebanon was premeditated—the soldiers' capture simply provided the excuse....
Since Israel's withdrawal from southern Lebanon in May 2000, there have been hundreds of violations of the "blue line" between the two countries. The United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (Unifil) reports that Israeli aircraft crossed the line "on an almost daily basis" between 2001 and 2003, and "persistently" until 2006....
In October 2000, the Israel Defence Forces shot at unarmed Palestinian demonstrators on the border, killing three and wounding 20. In response, Hizbullah crossed the line and kidnapped three Israeli soldiers. On several occasions, Hizbullah fired missiles and mortar rounds at IDF positions, and the IDF responded with heavy artillery and sometimes aerial bombardment. Incidents like this killed three Israelis and three Lebanese in 2003; one Israeli soldier and two Hizbullah fighters in 2005; and two Lebanese people and three Israeli soldiers in February 2006. Rockets were fired from Lebanon into Israel several times in 2004, 2005 and 2006, on some occasions by Hizbullah. But, the U.N. records, "none of the incidents resulted in a military escalation"....
So why was the Israeli response [to the July 12 raid] so different from all that preceded it? The answer is that it was not a reaction to the events of that day. The assault had been planned for months."


Posted in: _Palestine , _Geopolitics , _HumanRights