Norell said Israel ignored the warnings of the European
intermediaries. He said Israel "bet" on assurances from the international
community, particularly the United Nations, to supervise southern Lebanon.
Instead, the UN was said to have dismissed proposals to bolster its
peace-keeping force in the south.
"The summer 2006 war was therefore expected, even if its timing was
uncertain," Norell said.
The assertion was part of a report authored by Norell for the
Washington Institute for Near East Policy. For the first time, Norell, in a
report titled "A Victory for Islamism: The Second Lebanon War and its
Repercussions," outlined a three-year effort by Israel to win Hizbullah's
agreement to a withdrawal from southern Lebanon in exchange for a pledge by
the militia to halt attacks on the Jewish state.
Norell, a senior analyst at Swedish Defense Research Agency, said he
worked with Magnus Ranstorp, then a researcher at St. Andrews University in
Scotland, to form a channel for secret contacts between Israel and
Hizbullah. The channel operated from 1997 through 2000 as the two Europeans
relayed messages between Israel and Hizbullah.
Throughout the talks, Norell said, Israel was challenged by the prospect
of a Hizbullah takeover of southern Lebanon. He said Israel
understood that the Beirut government would require assistance to control
the south and end Hizbullah dominance.
"That the power vacuum arising from an Israeli withdrawal would lead to
a Hizbullah takeover was plain to see," Norell recalled. "At the time,
however, Syrian forces still occupied parts of Lebanon, and it was equally
obvious that the Lebanese government would not be able to reclaim the south
while Damascus backed Hizbullah and worked against any initiatives that did
not take Syrian interests into account. This was the message that the author
and Dr. Ranstorp brought back from encounters with Lebanese interlocutors."
Norell said the initiative for the backchannel with Israel came from
Beilin, then regarded as a leading strategist in the ruling Labor Party.
Beilin had long argued for a unilateral Israeli withdrawal from Lebanon,
assuring audiences that Hizbullah would then end attacks on the Jewish
state.
"As for the secret contacts preceding the 2000 withdrawal, their purpose
had been to investigate the consequences of a unilateral move out of the
Israeli security zone established in southern Lebanon in 1978," Norell said.
"The initiative came from Israeli politician Yossi Beilin, who for several
years had argued within the Labor Party in favor of such a move."
In wake of the Israeli withdrawal, Israel failed to maintain deterrence
against Hizbullah. Norell cited Israel's mild response to Hizbullah's
attacks on the Israeli border within weeks of the withdrawal.
"The result of this incident Ñ and the Israeli response Ñ was that
Hizbullah and Hamas realized that this kind of attack could pay off and that
Israel was not likely to react very strongly to relatively 'small'
incidents." Norell said.
Norell said Israel's unilateral withdrawal from Lebanon paved the way
for Hizbullah to turn from a militia into a fully-fledged military. He said
the Lebanese Army, with 70 percent of its privates being Shi'ites, would not
confront Hizbullah.
"It is a regular army, complete with its own uniforms, communications
network, and arms stockpiles," Norell said. "It is completely beyond the
control of any government institution. The Lebanese army's loss of
credibility may prove difficult to repair."
