“Stay two or three weeks longer and you can be a war correspondent,” said my Israeli brother-in-law, partly in jest. Three Katyusha 122 mm rockets fired from southern Lebanon had just caused minor damage (but no injuries) near his home in northern Galilee late last month. Israeli artillery blasted the suspected launch point. Officers dryly suggested that UNIFIL, the hapless United Nations peace-keeping force in Lebanon, might want to investigate. But the cross-border rocketing did not affect daily life or even off-season tourism along the shores of the Sea of Galilee the same day.
The strike was the seventh from Lebanon since Israel’s 2006 war against Hezbollah — the “Party of God” — and its allies ended with U.N. Security Council Resolution 1701. Among other things, that measure vainly called for Hezbollah’s disarmament. At that time, the Shi’ite movement, designated an international terrorist organization by the United States, was estimated to possess more than 10,000 short- and medium-range rockets and missiles. Today, under UNIFIL’s gaze, the arsenal has grown to an estimated 50,000 and Hezbollah is king-maker in Lebanon’s government.
