JERUSALEM -- So now, after Israel has taken self-defensive measures against the unprovoked aggression of Hamas and Hezbollah, Europe and the United Nations are calling upon Israel to show restraint. Yet if Israel is coerced to do that, once again the Arab aggressors in the Middle East will be allowed to escape from taking responsibility.
Indeed, if you listen to the Arab players in this recent round of Middle East violence, none of them bear any responsibility whatsoever for what has happened.
The Palestinians, instead of launching a nation-building process in Gaza once the Israelis had left, chose to launch Kassam rockets on the innocent civilians of Sderot and Ashkelon, in the south of Israel, to kill two soldiers and kidnap Cpl. Gilad Shalit. However, when Israel lost its patience and hammered Gaza to stop the Kassam rockets and bring the kidnapped soldier home, the Palestinians unified in singing together their usual hymn: It's all Israel's fault.
Ignoring terrorist Hezbollah
The same goes for the Lebanese front. In May 2000, Israel pulled out of Southern Lebanon, fully complying with U.N. Security Council Resolution 415. There was another U.N. Security Council Resolution, No. 1559, which called on all Lebanese militias -- including Hezbollah -- to disband. Yet the Lebanese government preferred to turn a blind eye to the terrorist Hezbollah state that emerged in south Lebanon. Following Hezbollah's unprovoked act of war, the Lebanese minister of information declared that ''the Lebanese government didn't know about it, so it doesn't bear any responsibility.'' Even by Middle Eastern standards, this is a bad joke.
As for Hezbollah, its leader, Hassan Nasralla, believed that by attacking Israeli communities and kidnapping two soldiers he could catch Israel in a bad moment, while it was struggling with the situation in Gaza. Soon enough, he found out that contrary to his expectations, Israel hadn't softened, but rather hit back fiercely, in a way that might eliminate Hezbollah's presence in Southern Lebanon. Now he moans that this wasn't a fair game: He ''only'' killed and kidnapped some Israeli soldiers, while Israel has been overreacting.
The same goes for Bashar Assad of Syria, who was caught in flagrante as the perpetrator of the assassination of Lebanese Premier Rafik Hariri. Apart from assisting U.S. enemies in Iraq, he also smuggled missiles and ammunition to Hezbollah. Yet according to him, Syria becoming a pariah state is not the result of his own doing, but of a "Zionist plot.''
In the wake of the Six Day War, Sadek Jalal al-Athem, who taught philosophy at the American University in Beirut, wrote: "Anyone who observed the Arab reality before and after the last war [1967] noticed the existence of a strong tendency which is typical of us, to make the greatest efforts to evade responsibility for the defeat we have just suffered and ascribe it to external factors over which we have no influence. This allows us to make excuses for the serious situation we have been put in, and neglect our duties vis-a-vis the primary Arab problem in particular and the challenges of modern civilization in general.''
Taking a region hostage
In light of this self-denial, it was refreshing to hear Saudi Arabia officially condemning Hezbollah at the beginning of the crisis: "It is time that these elements alone bear the full responsibility of these irresponsible acts and should alone shoulder the burden of ending the crisis they have created.''
It might turn out that by holding Hamas and Hezbollah accountable for their aggression, Israel is now doing a good service on behalf of the cause of peace. If such reckless conduct is allowed to continue, the Middle East will easily become chaotic, with every terrorist being able to take hostage not only a soldier, but the whole region. That, mind you, even before Iran -- the guru of all terrorists -- becomes nuclear.
This article was first published in The Miami Herald on August 4, 2006.
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The opinions expressed herein are the author's own personal opinions and do not necessarily reflect those of the Israel Democracy Institute.