PHOENIX MELVILLE – ANTI WAR CINEMA

A Reflection of – Waltz with Bashir – and the Middle East Conflict

Movies are like an expensive form of therapy for me.       –           Tim Burton

Waltz with Bashir is a 2008 Israeli adult animated battle dramatisation, written, and directed in the hands of Ari Folman. It follows Folman trying to forget memories of his experiences as a soldier during 1982 during the Lebanon War. The film is among the first Israeli animated films released in cinemas during the time since Joseph the Daydreamer (1962 ). The movie premiered at the 2008 Cannes Film Festival where it was a finalist for Palme d’Or, and also because it has been recognized and also nominated for a variety of other prestigious awards while receiving praise from the general public and people who are sceptical The film has been praised for the film’s designs, computer animation, and instructions, in addition to the story, editing and improving. The film has made an estimated $11 million and also has won numerous awards, including a  Golden Globe for best foreign film and a nomination for the Academy Award.

In this shocking animated documentary, Israeli filmmaker Ari Folman explores the horror of war and Israels Defense Force (IDF)  involvement in the murder of 3,000 non-armed Palestinian refugees (men, women, men, and even children) in the hands of Christian Phalangists during the invading of Lebanon in 1982. The film’s director begins by exchanging with a person who tells his story of a nightmare he had repeatedly experienced being chased by a pack of 26 dogs. The truth is that the man was a soldier from Lebanon that was ordered to eliminate all dogs that were barking in the village so that Palestinian terrorists wouldn’t be warned about the approaching of Israeli soldiers.

Folman is confused about what he’s not able to remember about his time in the Lebanon conflict. “That’s not stored in my system,” Folman says. The director talks with a therapist about his lack of memory. He also visits Carmi, an old acquaintance living in Holland. The soldier recalled taking a shot at an antique Mercedes with his colleagues and discovering that the vehicle included a civilian family. In the taxi, Folman starts to recall his experience in Lebanon. Another soldier recounts his escape from death in a rogue attack and how he swam in the ocean to the safety of the sea.

Folman has been stationed in The Sabra and Shatila refugee camps following the assassination of loved Christian Phalangist chief Bashir Gemayel. The soldiers of this militia were deployed into the camps to search for Palestinian terrorists. However, instead of focusing on these individuals, they routinely started to murder everyone, women and children. Folman and his colleagues put flares to aid in their efforts. The Israeli TV reporter says that the sight of the refugees with their hands atop their heads brought back the images of Jews surrendering in the Warsaw Ghetto.

When we watched this harrowing animated film, it reminded the people who stood in silence without doing anything to assist the Jews as they were transferred to concentration camps to be murdered. Folman lays out that Jewish soldiers also did the same as they did in the face of the murder of Palestinian refugees. In the notes to the film’s press release, Folman’s film, we are told that the Minister of Defence Ariel Sharon was found guilty by investigating the massacre for not doing enough to avoid the slaughter. Sharon was dismissed from his post and served as Minister for Defence for a second time. Twenty years later, he was elected as the first Prime Secretary of Israel.

Cast

The film features entirely fictional characters as well as versions of real people.

Ari Folman is an Israeli filmmaker who recently completed his reserve military service. He was a member of the IDF around 20 years before the Lebanon War.

Miki Leon plays Boaz Rein-Buskila, the accountant, an Israeli Lebanon War veteran suffering from nightmares.

Ori Sivan Ori Sivan, the Israeli filmmaker who co-directed two films alongside Folman, is a long-time ally of Folman.

Yehezkel Lazarov plays Carmi Canaan, the Israeli Lebanon War veteran who once had the honour of being Folman’s friend and living with his family in the Netherlands. Carmi decided to become a soldier in combat to prove his masculinity. However, he claims that after the conflict, “he could be nobody” in response to Folman’s comment that the man (Canaan) was supposed to be the best in science.

Ronny Dayag is an Israeli Lebanon War veteran and High Food Engineer. In his time in the conflict, he served as a Merkava trooper in the tank. Dayag admits to a survivor’s guilt following the ambush of his unit by a tank; he ran away, and the rest of his crew retreated, making him the sole remaining survivor.

Shmuel Frenkel is Shmuel Frenkel, an Israeli Lebanon War veteran. While in this war, Frenkel served as the commander of an infantry regiment. Through an interview with Frenkel, Folman understands that his mind could not process and suppress the fact that his team fought the boy with an RPG and was compelled to kill. Then, Frenkel is shown in an incident in which the soldiers are in the midst of the fire of surprise enemies from Beirut’s rooftops along the shoreline. Frenkel seems to be living entirely; however, it is described in the form of “some sort of trance” as he uses his MAG to help his friend as he “waltzes” between enemy bullets as Bashir’s face is shown as the background.

Zahava Solomon is an Israeli psychologist and researcher in psychological trauma. Zahava gives a professional assessment of certain events in the film using terms used in clinical research. For instance, Zahava explains that Folman’s encounter with the kid from RPG was largely forgotten because his brain employed dissociation, a mechanism to protect itself. She further demonstrates the mechanism by citing an example of a former patient who worked as a photographer during the war. The dissociation stopped working, which led to him losing his consciousness.

Ron Ben-Yishai, an Israeli journalist, was the first to document the massacre.

Dror Harazi is one of the Israeli Lebanon War veterans. During the conflict, he was the commander of a tank stationed in the Shatila Refugee Camp.

Production

The film took 4 years to finish. It’s unusual to be a feature-length documentary made mostly using animation. It blends classical music, music from the 1980s, real-looking graphics, surreal scenes with illustrations like comics. The film is animated, except for a short clip from news archives.

The film’s dark tones reflect the general mood that the movie has. This animation employs unique design techniques developed by Yoni Goodman in the Bridgit Folman Film Gang studio in Israel. Rotoscoping is often misunderstood, an animation style that employs drawings on live footage but mixes with Adobe Flash cutouts and classic animation. Each drawing was cut into pieces of hundreds which were then moved around each other, creating an illusion of motion. The film was initially recorded in the sound studio as a 90-minute film and later was transferred to a storyboard. Three hundred original drawings were created from the storyboard, which became the film’s scenes using Flash animation, traditional animation, and 3D technology.

The minimalist electronic artist Max Richter created the soundtrack.

Certain reviewers have seen the music as having an active commentary on events rather than simply a simple accompaniment.

The comics genre, specifically Joe Sacco, the novels Catch-22, The Adventures of Wesley Jackson, and Slaughterhouse-Five, as well as artist Otto Dix were mentioned by Folman and artistic director David Polonsky as influences on the film. The film was made into a graphic novel in 2009.

About Ari Folman

He is an Israeli film director, screenwriter and composer of film scores. He was born in Haifa in 1962; he’s been a prolific filmmaker since the beginning of the 1990s with his documentary films that focus on Israeli society and its politics. Ari Folman married his wife Anne-Francoise on August 18th, 1944. They have a son together named Jean-Pierre.

The wife of the husband is also a film producer. They reside in Tel Aviv. In 2006, he was director of BeTipul, the Hot 3 famous drama series BeTipul. Folman’s latest venture is an animated drama based on Anne Frank’s life Anne Frank during the Holocaust and titled Where is Anne Frank? The film was announced in March 2019, and Folman said that the animation was finished, and the voiceovers had been recorded in English; however, no release date was determined yet.

Education life

Ari Folman studied at Tel Aviv University’s Department of Film and Television, as an animation student. After graduating in 1993, Folman pursued film-directing studies in Jerusalem’s Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design. He graduated in 1995. His initial attempt at making money from animation production was unsuccessful after making a single short animated film on Israeli television. Then he returned home to Tel Aviv and started working as an animator for music videos, commercials, and title sequences up to 1997. He came up with the idea of Waltz with Bashir, a film that chronicled what he experienced during his time in Lebanon as part of Operation Accountability. The following five years writing the script and directed an animated film titled Waltz with Bashir.

Career

He is probably most famous for his animated documentary film Waltz With Bashir and directing the live-action/animated feature The Congress. He plans to make an animated feature film based on Anne Frank’s life. Anne Frank during the Holocaust. Waltz, featuring Bashir Ari Folman,” The memories from the aftermath of 1982’s Sabra and the Shatila massacre, which occurred when he was 19, formed the basis for his film” Waltz with Bashir.

It follows an attempt to recall his memories of war through sessions of therapy and conversations with his old acquaintances and fellow Israelis in Beirut when the slaughter took place. Since 2006, he has been the writer in charge of Beautiful, the Hot 3 drama series Beautiful. Folman made his debut in the film industry by making documentaries. Sha’anan Si, his upcoming film, was co-directed by Ori Sivan in 1991. It was awarded one Ophir Award (Israeli Oscar Award), an award from the Jerusalem Film Festival Prize, and various International Film Awards. He directed the film by Ori Sivan in 1996, Saint Clara, also directed by Ori Sivan, won by the Karlovy-Vary International Film Festival, which was the highest prize awarded to the film at the Haifa International Film Festival, along with the six Ophir Awards for best director and best film, top actress and best acting support, best editing, and an outstanding score.

 He also produced and directed his 2001 feature film Made in Israel, for which he received nominations for the Ophir Awards for best director.

When Folman was an infantry soldier who was 19 years of age serving as a member of the Israeli Defense Forces during the 1982 Lebanon War, he witnessed the aftermath of the massacres at camps Sabra and Shatila Palestinian camp for refugees by Christians who belonged to The Lebanese Khalangist Militia.

The film he directed in 2008, Waltz with Bashir, is a story of his quest to recover the memory of war by undergoing therapy sessions and discussions with the soldiers he served with and the other Israelis during the war in Beirut during the conflict.  The animated film was nominated for several BAFTA awards, an award from the Cannes Film Festival, and the American Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film.

Israel and Lebanon war

The Israeli-Lebanese war, also known as the South Lebanon conflict, involved Israel, Lebanon, Syria, and Syria, the Palestine Liberation Organisation, and different militias operating from inside Lebanon. The conflict was fought during the Lebanese Civil War, and the conflict reached its peak in the 1980s before fading away.

The Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) was a militant group that recruited militants from Lebanon from refugees from the Palestinian refugees who were removed or fled the country following the founding by Israel in 1948. The PLO direction and Fatah brigade were ejected from Jordan in the 1970s and 1970s for inciting an uprising; they retreated to Southern Lebanon, increasing internal and border violence. As a result, the tensions among the populations over tensions over the Lebanese National Pact caused an outbreak of the Lebanese Civil War (1975-1990).PLO played a role in the main elements that led to the outbreak of the Lebanese Civil War, and its tense combats with Lebanese factions triggered foreign intervention. Israel’s invasion in 1978 of Lebanon forced the PLO to the north of the Litani River, but the PLO continued its war against Israel. Israel attacked Lebanon once more in the year 1982 with the help of the major Lebanese Christian militias, Lebanese Forces, and Kataeb Party and forcibly expelled the PLO. In 1983, Israel, as well as Lebanon, agreed to sign the April 17 Agreement that established an agreement to normalise bilateral relations between both nations. However, relations were strained by the taking over of Shia and Druze militias in the early part of 1984. Israel pulled out of the majority of the country of Lebanon in 1985. Still, it maintained the control of a 19-kilometre buffer zone, which was defended by militias acting as proxy members of the South Lebanon Army (SLA).

The year 1985 was when Hezbollah, one of the Lebanese Shia radical groups backed by Iran, demanded an armed battle to stop the Israeli occupation of Lebanese territory. After a peace agreement, the Lebanese civil war was over and the other factions fighting were willing to surrender, Hezbollah and the SLA did not agree. Fighting with Hezbollah reduced Israeli determination, which led to the collapse of the SLA and an Israeli withdrawal in 2000 on their side of the UN-designated border.

The reason for this was Israeli control over the Shebaa Farms. Hezbollah continued cross-border attacks frequently over the next six years. Hezbollah was now seeking freedom for Lebanese citizens held in Israeli prisons and captured Israeli soldiers to force an exchange of prisoners in 2004. The capture of two Israeli troops by Hezbollah started an outbreak of the Lebanon War. The ceasefire demanded the disarmament of Hezbollah and the respect for the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Lebanon by Israel.

The ceasefire formally ended September 8 on September 8. As of the date of the writing, the situation was peaceful despite both sides breaking ceasefire agreements. Israel flew near-daily over flights in Lebanese territory, as Hezbollah did not cease its arms.

World War I and Mandate

The regions that became those states, Israel, and Lebanon were an integral part of the Ottoman Empire which lasted from 1299 until its fall during World War I and subsequent dissolution in 1922. In the aftermath of the Sinai and Palestine Campaign 1917 in 1917, the British took over Palestine and portions of Syria. French troops seized Damascus at the end of 1918.

The predominantly Christian area that was part of the French Mandate changed into France’s controlled Lebanese Republic after 1926. Lebanon was granted independence in 1943, while France was under German occupation. However, French troops weren’t free until 1946.The increase in anti-Semitism across Europe and culminating with the Holocaust during World War II had resulted in an increase of Jewish immigrants into the minority Jewish majoritarian Arab Mandate. In the 1936-39 Arab rebellion, the British began to rely on Jewish police officers to keep order. The resultant increase in tensions among ethnic groups and violent clashes between Arabs and Jews because of Jewish integration and cooperation forced the British to leave in 1947.

1948 Arab–Israeli War

In 1948, the Lebanese army had the smallest regional army globally, comprising only 3,500 troops. Following the direction of Arab leaders from this region, Lebanon agreed to join forces with other arms gathered within the boundaries of the British Mandate territory of Palestine to take over Palestine. Lebanon pledged 1,000 troops to fight for the cause. The Arab forces waited for the ending of the Mandate and the disengagement of British forces to be scheduled for May 15, 1948.

Israel declared independence on May 14, 1948. Israel declared its independence on May 14th 1948. In a cablegram that was officially issued that day, the seven members of the Arab League, including Lebanon, announced their intention of establishing the free and democratic “United States of Palestine” to replace the United Nations Partition Plan for Palestine. The League was soon involved in the conflict with the support of Palestinian Arabs, thus beginning the international phase of the 1948 Arab-Israeli War. Egypt, Lebanon, Syria, Transjordan, and Iraq declared war on the newly-formed State of Israel. They were hoping to win easily and quickly in what was later known as” 1948 Arab-Israeli War. Lebanese soldiers joined the Lebanese army joined other Arab armies to fight the invading armies. It crossed into the northern part of Galilee. However, by the time the war was over, it was repelled from the north by Israeli forces, which had been in control of South Lebanon. Israel reached armistice deals with each of its invading neighbours. The armistice agreement with Lebanon came into effect on March 23, 1949. As part of the deal with Lebanon, Israeli forces withdrew towards the border with Lebanon.

At the end of that conflict, Israel had signed ceasefire agreements with all of its neighbour’s Arab nations. The territories now controlled far beyond the area originally allotted in the United Nations Partition Plan, including a large portion of the promises made for Palestinian Arabs under the Partition Plan. Palestinian Arabs under the Plan. All state parties also understood that the armistice agreement was not a peace agreement with Israel and was not the final solution to the war, including the boundaries.

Following the conflict and the war, the United Nations estimated 711,000Palestinian Arabs from an estimated 1.8 million living within The Mandate of Palestine fled either emigrated or exiled from Israel and re-entered neighbouring countries. In 1949 111,000 Palestinian Arabs in Lebanon were transferred to camps established and managed through the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East.

Apart from two camps located in the Beirut region, most of the camps were Muslim. Lebanese Christians feared that the Muslim arrival would impact their power in politics and result in an ethnic majority. So, they placed limitations on the rights imposed on Palestinian refugees. They were not able to work, travel or participate in political activities. At first they were not able to establish an organisation that would effectively represent their interests. The less democratic regimes were also worried about the threat of refugees to their rule; however, Lebanon could not withstand repression.

The Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) hired members of the militant group in Lebanon from Palestinian refugees who left Israel in 1948.

War over water and 1967 Six-Day War

Despite being a part of the tensions that continue to rage between border countries regarding the issue of water, Lebanon rejected calls by other Arab governments to take part in the Six-Day War. Lebanon could not afford the risk of conflict with Israel in the south, where it is weak militarily.

But the loss of additional territories agitated the Palestinians who were confined to refugee camps hoping to make it back home. The increased refugee influx turned Palestinian camps across the Middle East into centers of militant activity.

Rise of the PLO militants (1968–1975)

The PLO was founded in 1964 under the leadership of Ahmed Shuker. It began executing many terror attacks on Israeli civilians to fulfill its mission charter’s promise to follow “the path of holy war (al-jihad)” until the creation of a Palestinian state to replace Israel. The state of Israel. The string of terror attacks (such as the bombings in 1966 of Romema, Jerusalem) drove the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) to strike back to provoke the long-running and unresolved war among and the PLO and the IDF.

From 1968, the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) began to conduct raids from Lebanon to Israel. Israel began conducting retaliatory attacks against Lebanese villages to motivate residents to confront the fedayeen. Following the incident in which machine guns were shot at one Israeli airline at Athens Airport, Israel raided the Beirut International Airport in retaliation and destroyed 13 aircraft.

The civilian population without arms could not dispel foreigners with arms, and their Lebanese military was ineffective militarily and politically. The Palestinian camps fell under Palestinian control following a series of clashes between the years 1968 and 1969, between the Lebanese army and newly formed Palestinian rebel forces. The 1969 Cairo Agreement guaranteed refugees to work, create self-governing groups, and participate in armed conflict. “The Palestinian resistance movement assumed the day-to-day management of refugee camps and provided security and various healthcare, educational, as well as social services.

May 8, 1970, On May 8, 1970, May 8 1970 a PLO group known as “the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine (DFLP) crossed into Israel and executed an attack on the Avivim school bus massacre.

In the year 1970 in the year 1970, the PLO attempted to topple the monarch of Jordan – King Hussein from Jordan. After his rebels’ defeat in the events that Arab historians refer to as Black September, the PLO leaders and their soldiers fled from Jordan. They headed to Syria and Lebanon, and Lebanon, where violence across borders was escalating.

With its headquarters located in Beirut, PLO factions recruited new members from Palestinian camps for refugees. South Lebanon was nicknamed “Fatahland” because of its dominance in Yasser Arafat’s Fatah group. With its army freely operating within Lebanon, the PLO was able to establish an entity that was a state within a country. In 1975, more than 300,000 Palestinian people who had been displaced lived in Lebanon.

In the wake of the 2002 Munich massacre of 1972, Israel was able to carry out Operation Spring of Youth. The elite Israeli Special Forces landed by boat in Lebanon on April 9, 1973. With the assistance of Israeli security agents, they snuck into Lebanon’s PLO Headquarters in Beirut and assassinated several organisation leaders.

In 1974, the PLO changed its mission to include the political elements that are essential to establish a dialogue with Israel. People wanted an option of a military intervention designed to create an organisation called the Rejectionist Front, and Yassir Arafat assumed the PLO the leadership position. The Protection of Palestine General Command, which split from the PLO in 1974, was responsible for the Kiryat Shmona massacre in April. In May 1974, the DFLP crossed into Israel and committed the Ma’alot massacre.

Lebanese Civil War (1975–1990)

The Lebanese Civil War (1975-1990) was a war that involved various groups and shifting alliances between Lebanese Maronite Catholics, Lebanese Muslims, Palestinian Muslims, Lebanese Druze, and other non-sectarian groups. The power of the government was allocated between the various religious groups through the National Pact based partially on the results of the census in 1932. Population changes and the increase of sentiments of being deprived of certain ethnic groups, and Israel-Palestinian conflicts in the southern part of the county were all factors that led to the beginning of the Lebanese Civil War.

Israeli assistance for Lebanese Forces

The month of May 1976 saw Israel provided in May 1976, Israel supplied Maronite militias, which included The Lebanese Forces, led by Bachir Gemayel, with weapons, tanks, weapons, and advisors. The boundary that separated Israel and Lebanon was in the early days known as”the good” Fence.

Believing that the country would lose trade access for the ports of Beirut in June 1976, Syria joined the war to help its Maronite-dominated regime. In October, there were more than 40,000 troops stationed in Lebanon.

Operation Litani

On March 11, 1978, 11 PLO militants were seen landing on a beach 30 kilometres away. from Haifa, Israel, where they took over an entire bus and killed the passengers in what’s known as the Coastal Road massacre. On the day of the incident, nine hijackers and 38 Israeli civilians (including 13 children) died.

On March 14, 1978, Israel started Operation Litani and occupied the southern region of Lebanon and surrounding areas, except the city, which was surrounded by 25,000 troops. The goal was to drive away from the PLO out of the frontier and build the Lebanese Christian militia allied with Israel known as the South Lebanese Army (SLA). But the PLO determined by the operation’s name that the attack would cease in the Litani River and moved their forces to the north, leaving an unspecified force of a couple hundred soldiers. The victims were mostly civilians.

On the 19th of March 1978 The United Nations Security Council passed Resolution 425, which called for Israel’s immediate withdrawal and the creation of a United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon.

 After Israel forces disbanded in 1978, they handed over the positions they had taken in Lebanon over to the South Lebanon Army. The South Lebanon Army continued to fight as a proxy of Israel to fight the PLO until Israel defeated the PLO away from Lebanon in 1982.

On April 22, 1979, Samir Kuntar and three others from the Palestine Liberation Front, an occasionally-formed part of the PLO, were spotted on Nahariya, Israel, from Tyre, Lebanon, by boat. After killing a policeman who was alerted that they were there, the group held two fathers and their daughters hostage in an apartment. After fleeing with hostages and police on the beach, a shootout took the lives of one policeman as well as two militants. Kuntar was then able to kill the hostages before he and other attackers were remanded.

The month of April was 1981. the United States brokered a cease-fire in the southern part of Lebanon along with Israel, Syria, and the PLO.

1983 The Israeli-Lebanese agreement and their reversal

1983 in 1983, the United States brokered the May 17 Agreement, a peace agreement with Israel and Lebanon in its entirety, minus. The agreement stipulated an accelerated Israeli withdrawal over the next eight to 12 weeks and created a “security zone” to be monitored by the Lebanese Army in southern Lebanon but was subject to Syrian withdrawal. On August 3, 1983, Lebanese groups clashed to control the newly liberated territory after Israel was forced to withdraw from the areas south of Beirut up to Awali River. Awali River.

In February 1984, The Lebanese Army collapsed, with numerous units joining their militias. Shia and Druze militias seized much of Beirut at the beginning of 1984, consolidating their power. In early 1984, the National Assembly of Lebanon, under pressure from Syria and Muslim militias, pulled out based on the May 17 Agreement on March 5, 1984.

On January 15, 1985, Israel implemented a gradual withdrawal strategy before retreating towards the Litani River to form the 4-12 kilometre (2.5-7.5 miles) deep Israeli Security Zone while using the indigenous South Lebanese Army militia to aid in its control.

SLA Conflict between HTML0 and Hezbollah (February 1985 from February 1985 to May 2000)

Consolidation of Hezbollah

On February 16 in 1985, Shia Sheik Ibrahim al-Amin issued an official statement in Lebanon in which he announced Hezbollah’s resistance movement, whose objectives included fighting against Israel. Israeli occupation. In the South Lebanon conflict (1985-2000) in 1985-2000, the Hezbollah militia carried out an armed guerrilla war against Israeli forces in Southern Lebanon and their South Lebanon Army proxy. “Throughout 1985-92, there were very few limited exchanges between Israeli and Hezbollah or Amal forces in southern Lebanon” and “except 1988, in which 21 Israeli soldiers were shot dead, the total number of Israeli mortalities per year in this period was within the single digits “.

At the close of 1990, at the time of the 1990 elections, the Lebanese Civil War was effectively ended. In March of 1991, the National Assembly of Lebanon passed an amnesty law to forgive all political crimes before its adoption. In May 1991, all militias were disbanded, with notable exceptions to Hezbollah and the SLA. They were replaced by the Lebanese Armed Forces and slowly rebuilt themselves as the country’s sole significant non-sectarian institution.

Belt security conflict

From 1985 to 2000, Israel continued to support the South Lebanon Army. The year 1992 was the first time Hezbollah was able to win ten of the 128 seats at the Lebanese National Assembly.

On July 25 in 1993, Israel launched Operation Accountability, also known as the Seven-Day War in Lebanon. The stated reason was revenge for the deaths of IDF soldiers within the “security zone,” which Israel had established in 1985 in the southern part of Lebanon to guard the northern border from Hezbollah as well as The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine in the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine General Command. On July 10, Hezbollah launched an attack in which five Israeli soldiers died. An additional attack on July 19 caused many more casualties to the IDF and then on the 23rd. An additional Israeli soldier died. The frequent cross-border attacks were by both sides, and Operation Accountability arose from the increase in conflict. Several buildings were targeted and 120 people, and 500,000 civilians were displaced. Israeli soldiers also destroyed important infrastructures like bridges and power stations. As per Michael Brecher, Operation Accountability intended to cause a huge flow of Lebanese refugees from the south to Beirut and put the Lebanese authorities under pressure to control Hezbollah. Hezbollah returned with rockets at Israeli villages, but there were fewer casualties. After Lebanon expressed its grievances to the UN, the Security Council called on Israel to pull its forces out of Lebanese territory. A peace agreement mediated by the US resulted in an Israeli commitment to stop attacks from the north within its zone of security in Lebanon and a Hezbollah agreement to stop shooting rockets into Israel.

On April 11 April 11, the year 1996, Israel began Operation Grapes of Wrath, which is called in Lebanon in Lebanon as the April War, which repeated the pattern of Operation Accountability. This was initiated by rockets fired from Hezbollah Katyusha into Israel in reaction to the murder by two Lebanese through an IDF missile and the death of a Lebanese boy who was hit by a roadside bomb. Israel carried out massive airstrikes and extensive shelling of the southern part of Lebanon. In 106, Lebanese were killed in the bombardment of Qana if the UN building was struck by Israeli shelling. The war ended on April 26, 1996, through the Ceasefire Understanding between the two countries. Hezbollah and Israel signed a contract to adhere to and observe the “rules of the game” and refrain from attacks on civilians.

On January 20, 2000, Hezbollah assassinated the man responsible for day-to-day SLA operations, Lieutenant Colonel Akel Hashem. In apparent retaliation to the assassination, Israel’s Israeli Air Force, on February 7, attacked the civilian infrastructure of Lebanon, which included power stations at Baalbek, Deir Nbouh, and Jabbour. Eighteen people are reported to be injured.

In the wake of its declaration of intention to implement UNSC Resolution 425 on April 1, 1998, and following the demise of the South Lebanon Army in confronting a Hezbollah assault, Israel declared May 24 of 2000. They would be withdrawing towards their part of the UN’s designated border called the Blue Line, 22 years after the resolution was accepted. The South Lebanon Army’s equipment and its positions were largely taken over by the forces of Hezbollah. Lebanon is celebrating May 25, Liberation Day, as an official holiday for the nation.

Border Assassinations and clashes (September 2000 to July 2006)

As of September 2000, Hezbollah formed an election alliance with the Amal movement. The party won the 23 seats in parliament allocated to south Lebanon in the first vote since 1972.

On October 7, 2000, Three Israeli soldiers were killed. Adi Avitan and Staff Sgt. Benyamin Avraham, and Staff Sgt. Omar Sawaidwere was kidnapped by Hezbollah along the border between Lebanon and Israel. They were shot dead in the course of their attack or within its immediate aftermath.

Following the time that Hezbollah murdered an Israeli soldier during an attack against an armored bulldozer, which had crossed over the border to clear bombs, on January 20, 2004, Israel destroyed two of the group’s bases.

On January 29, 2004, as part of a prisoner swap mediated by Germany once Amal security chief Mustafa Dirani, who Israeli commandos had seized in 1994 along with the 22 additional Lebanese detainees, 400 Palestinians, and 12 Israeli Arabs were released from Israeli prisons to exchange Israeli investor Elchanan Tenenbaum, who Hezbollah was captured in October 2000. Remains of 59 Lebanese civilians and militants and the bodies of three Israeli soldiers who were captured on October 7, 2000, were a part of the swap. Hezbollah demanded that maps of Israeli mining operations in South Lebanon be included in the agreement.

In May 2004, Hezbollah militants killed an Israeli soldier near the Israeli-held Shebaa Farms border. From July to August of 2004, it was a time that saw a more intense border war. Hezbollah claimed that the conflict started with Israeli forces attacking its positions. In contrast, Israel declared that Hezbollah was the one who started the battle by launching sniper attacks at a border outpost.

On September 2, 2004, Resolution 1559 was ratified at the United Nations Security Council, calling for disbanding the entire Lebanese militia. The Israeli government interpreted an armoured Hezbollah as a violation of Resolution 1559. The Lebanese government was not in agreement with this view.

Syrian troops were withdrawn from Lebanon in April of 2005.

On May 26, 2006, the car bomb was found to be the cause of death for Palestinian Islamic Jihad leader Mahmoud Majzoub and his brother in Sidon. Premier of Lebanon Fuad Saniora called Israel the main suspect. However, Israel did not deny involvement. On May 28, 2006, missiles were fired out of Lebanon to Israel.

On June 10, 2006, The Lebanese army detained members of a suspected Israeli spy ring, which included Mahmoud Rafeh and his wife and two of his children. Police found bomb-making tools codes, a machine to make bombs, and other equipment for espionage in his house. Rafeh admitted to the Majzoub murders while working for Mossad and acknowledged that his group had killed the two Hezbollah leaders in 2003 and 1999. His son was Ahmed Jibril, leader of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine General Command in 2002. The former Lebanese minister Walid Jumblatt, an outspoken opponent of Hezbollah, thought that the spotting that the spying ring had been exposed was a Hezbollah fabrication.

2006 Lebanon War

On July 12, 2006, in a situation known as the Zar’it-Shula event, the Hezbollah launched diversionary rocket attacks against Israeli military posts near the coast, and also near Zeit, which is an Israeli frontier village Zar’it and an additional Hezbollah group crossed the border from Lebanon to Israel and attacked the two Israeli Army vehicles and killed 3 Israeli soldiers and capturing two.

Hezbollah immediately demanded the freedom of Lebanese prisoners detained by Israel and Samir Kuntar and the alleged perpetrator. They survived the Coastal Road massacre in exchange for the release of captured soldiers. The fierce conflict between the two sides was exchanged along the Blue Line, with Hezbollah attacking IDF positions close to Israeli settlements.

This was the beginning of the start of the Lebanon War. Israel responded with massive airstrikes and artillery firing on targets across Lebanon and the naval and air blockade and a land invasion in the southern part of Lebanon. In Lebanon, the war claimed the lives of more than 1,100 people, including combatants. It also severely damaged infrastructure and caused the displacement of approximately one million. Israel saw 42 civilian deaths because of the ongoing attack by rockets that landed in northern Israel, resulting in an exodus of half one million Israelis. The normal life of many of Lebanon and northern Israel has been disrupted, and the loss of life in battle.

The United Nations negotiated a ceasefire on August 14, 2006. Blockades were lifted on September 8.

Phoenix Melville is a British-French director, writer and artist.

https://www.phoenixmelville.com/