Les délices de la “défaite”…

“Défaite”, certes, le mot est certainement paradoxal si l’on considère la situation sur le terrain, au Sud Liban. Il n’est pas tout à fait déplacé pour autant. Dans les considérations relatives à nos spéculations et par rapport aux réputations des uns et des autres, et notamment à la réputation d’invincibilité de Tsahal, alors oui, sans hésiter, Israël et Tsahal sont en train de subir une “défaite”. Gidéon Lévy l’appelle plutôt : “échec”, et c’est pour s’en réjouir, — «  To failure's credit », dans Haaretz, aujourd’hui.

Le raisonnement de Lévy, adversaire de la guerre et de la “méthode forte” affectionnée par Tsahal, est limpide. Une victoire fracassante de l’armée israélienne, comme celle qu’on attendait, aurait plongé dans l’ivresse les tenants de cette force tant admirée et les aurait conduits sur des chemins de traverse particulièrement dangereux, — y compris pour la sécurité d’Israël au bout du compte. Au contraire, cet échec débarrasse les esprits trop vulnérables de toute ivresse conquérante sans compromettre la sécurité d’Israël. Tout le monde se retrouve les pieds sur terre. C’est alors, estime Lévy, que des développements politiques positifs (selon son point de vue) sont possibles.

« The bad (and predictable) news: Israel is going to come out of this war with the lower hand. The good (and surprising) news: This ringing failure could spell good tidings. If Israel had won the battles in an easy, sweeping victory of the kind Israelis prayed so much for, it would have caused enormous damage to Israel's security policies. Another slam-bam win would have brought disaster upon us. Drugged with power, drunk with victory, we would have been tempted to implement our success in other arenas. Dangerous fire would have threatened the entire region and nobody knows what might have resulted.

» On the other hand, the failure in this little war might teach us an important lesson for the future, and maybe influence us to change our ways and language, the language we speak to our neighbors with violence and force. The axiom that “Israel cannot allow itself a defeat on the battlefield” has already been exposed as a nonsensical cliche: Failure might not only help Israel greatly but, as a bonus, it might teach the Americans the important lesson that there is no point in pushing Israel into military adventures.

(…)

» The IDF's failure against Hezbollah is not a fateful defeat. Israel killed and absorbed casualties, but its existence or any part of its territory were not endangered for a moment. Our favorite phrase, “an existential war” is nothing more than another expression of the ridiculous pathos of this war, which from the start was a cursed war of choice.

» Hezbollah did not capture territory from Israel and its defeat is tolerable even though it could have easily been avoided if we had not undertaken our foolish Lebanese adventure. It is not difficult to imagine what would have happened if Hezbollah had been defeated within a few days from the air, as promised from the start by the bragging of the heads of the IDF. The success would have made us insane. The U.S. would have pushed us into a military clash with Syria and, drunk with victory, we might have been tempted. Iran might have been next. At the same time we would have dealt with the Palestinians: What went so easily in Lebanon, we would have been convinced, would be easily implemented from Jenin to Rafah. The result would have been an attempt to solve the Palestinian problem at its root by pounding, erasing, bombing and shelling.

» Maybe all that won't happen now because we have discovered first-hand that the IDF's power is much more limited than we thought and were told. Our deterrent capacity might now work in the opposite direction. Israel, hopefully, will think twice before going into another dangerous military adventure. That is comforting news… »

Mis en ligne le 13 août 2006 à 15H10