Grandma's army

A WAR OR NOT A WAR? It was neither the intention of Israel or Lebanon to start a war between the two countries. However, a military conflict began in July 2006 when Hizbollah terrorists ambushed an Israeli army border patrol, kidnapping two Israeli soldiers and killing three others. Stuart Palmer, one of my fellow residents in “Protea” (senior residence home), coined the above title in a booklet of his personal reflections. Stuart and his wife were living in Haifa, which was in the line of fire (together with Tiberias, Nazareth, Safed ), when the “war” broke out. [Since retiring, Stuart has become the Northern Area Director of ICAN (Israeli Citizens Action Network) and a member of BIG (British Israel Group), whose organisations are actively involved in advocating Israel’s position in the conflict with the Palestinians and now Hizbollah.] According to Stuart’s well-researched booklet: In the space of a few days, two million Israelis became under the threat of the thousands of ro

  Since their expulsion from Jordan in 1970, a force of close to 18,000 PLO (Palestinian Liberation Organisation) members were encamped in scores of locations in Lebanon. It was estimated that 5,500 were foreign mercenaries from Libya, Iraq, India, Sri Lanka, Chad and Mozambique. Israel later discovered enough light arms and other weapons to equip five brigades: Katyushka rockets, anti-aircraft network, hundreds of tanks. Syria brought surface-to-air missiles – creating yet another danger for Israel. Israeli strikes and commando raids were unable to stem the growth of this PLO   army. The situation in northern Israel became a living hell. Thousands of residents either had to flee from their homes, or to spend large amounts of time in bomb shelters. Israel was not prepared to wait for more deadly attacks to be launched against its civilian population before acting against the terrorists. Following the attempted assassination of the Israeli ambassador in London, Israel attacked PLO