Hamas War

Thursday, July 27, 2006

WHAT HIZBULLAH NEEDS: A GOOD LESSON


I received this a little while ago by e-mail. It was signed off by one Gregory van Kipnis, who is apparently a Wall St. businessman, but is actually the work of David Bogner of Treppenwitz blog. This is far from “politically correct,” but he really tells it like it is – and thus it was too good to pass up.

A difficult lesson, by David Bogner

When I was in the Navy, I once witnessed a bar fight in downtown Olongapo (Philippines) that still haunts my dreams. The fight was between a big oafish Marine and a rather soft-spoken, medium sized Latino sailor from my ship.

All evening the Marine had been trying to pick a fight with one of us and had finally set his sights on this diminutive shipmate of mine...figuring him for a safe target. When my friend refused to be goaded into a fight the Marine sucker punched him from behind on the side of the head so hard that blood instantly started to pour from this poor man's mutilated ear.

Everyone present was horrified and was prepared to absolutely murder this Marine, but my shipmate quickly turned on him and began to single-handedly back him towards a corner with a series of stinging jabs and upper cuts that gave more than a hint to a youth spent boxing in a small gym in the Bronx.

Each punch opened a cut on the Marine's startled face and by the time he had been backed completely into the corner he was blubbering for someone to stop the fight. He invoked his split lips and chipped teeth as reasons to stop the fight. He begged us to stop the fight because he could barely see through the river of blood that was pouring out of his split and swollen brows.

Nobody moved. Not one person.

The only sound in the bar was the sickening staccato sound of this sailor's lightning fast fists making contact with new areas of the Marine's head. The only sound I have heard since that was remotely similar was from the first Rocky film when Sylvester Stallone was punching sides of beef in the meat locker.

Finally the Marine's pleading turned to screams.... a high, almost womanly shriek. And still the punches continued relentlessly.

Several people in the bar took a few tentative steps as though they wanted to try to break it up at that point, but hands reached out from the crowd and held them tight. I'm not ashamed to say that mine were two of the hands that held someone back.

You see, in between each blow the sailor had begun chanting a soft cadence: "Say [punch] you [punch] give [punch] up [punch]... say [punch] you [punch] were [punch] wrong [punch]".

He had been repeating it to the Marine almost from the start but we only became aware of it when the typical barroom cheers had died down and we began to be sickened by the sight and sound of the carnage.

This Marine stood there shrieking in the corner of the bar trying futilely to block the carefully timed punches that were cutting his head to tatters... right down to the skull in places. But he refused to say that he gave up... or that he was wrong.

Even in the delirium of his beating he believed in his heart that someone would stop the fight before he had to admit defeat. I'm sure this strategy had served him well in the past and had allowed him to continue on his career as a barroom bully.

Finally, in a wail of agony the Marine shrieked, "I give up", and we gently backed the sailor away from him.

I'm sure you can guess why I have shared this story today. I'm not particularly proud to have been witness to such a bloody spectacle, and the sound of that Marine's woman-like shrieks will haunt me to my grave. But I learned something that evening that Israel had better learn for itself if it is to finally be rid of at least one of its tormentors:

This is one time an Arab aggressor must be allowed to be beaten so badly that every civilized nation will stand in horror, wanting desperately to step in and stop the carnage... but knowing that the fight will only truly be over when one side gives up and finally admits defeat.

Just as every person who had ever rescued that bully from admitting defeat helped create the cowardly brute I saw that evening in the bar, every well-intentioned power that has ever stepped in and negotiated a ceasefire for an Arab aggressor has helped create the monsters we see around us today.

President Lahoud of Lebanon, a big Hezbollah supporter and a close ally of Syria, has been shrieking non-stop to the UN Security Council for the past two days to get them to force Israel into a cease fire.

Clearly he has been reading his autographed copy of 'Military Success for Dummies / Arab Despots' by the late Gamal Abdel Nasser of Egypt. Ever since Nasser accidentally discovered the trick in '56, every subsequent Arab leader has stuck to his tried and true formula for military success:

Instigate a war. Once the war is well underway and you are in the process of having your rear handed to you... get a few world powers to force your western opponent into a cease fire. Whatever you do, don't surrender or submit to any terms dictated by your enemy. That would ruin everything! All you have to do is wait it out and eventually the world will become sickened at what is being done to your soldiers and civilian population... and will force a truce. Once a truce has been called you can resume your intransigence (which probably caused the conflict in the first place), and even declare victory as your opponent leaves the field of battle. This tactic has never failed. Not once.

In fact it worked so will for the Egyptians in 1973, that to this day they celebrate the Yom Kippur War - a crushing defeat at the hands of Israel - as a military victory! No kidding... it's a national holiday over there!

President Lahoud has already begun to shriek like a schoolgirl to the UN Security Council to "Stop the violence and arrange a cease-fire, and then after that we'll be ready to discuss all matters."

Uh huh. Forgive me if I find that a tad hard to swallow. He allowed Hezbollah to take over his country. He allowed the regular Lebanese army to provide radar targeting data for the Hezbollah missile that struck the Israeli destroyer. He has turned a blind eye while Iranian and Syrian weapons, advisers and money have poured into his country.

And now that his country is in ruins he wants to call it a draw.

As much as it may sicken the world to stand by and watch it happen, strong hands need to hold back the weak-hearted and let the fight continue until one side finally admits unambiguous defeat.

7 comments:

Cosmic X said...

It's Treppenwitz:

http://bogieworks.blogs.com/treppenwitz/2006/07/thanks_i_needed.html

yitz said...

Thanks CX, I needed that! Corrected. Please note that there are already over 100 comments to Dave's piece, as well as oodles of links & trackbacks. I've added a link here as well.

Anonymous said...

Why am I afraid of that outcome?

One of my favourite protagonists in the torah is Pinchas. Grandson to Aharon the Cohen Gadol, he saw something wrong with the tribal nasi/prince horizontal with a midianite wench and took the law into his hands killing both in full sight of everyone. HOn top of that, he was lauded but for one single reason; his heart was pure.

These days, we are personally virtually forbidden to carry out extrajudicial punishment since we are tainted with alterior thoughts be it revenge, glory, prestige, and favourable outcome. Last year, a young man stabbed three people at a pride parade, maybe one day, we will find whether his heart was pure or not.

Now I know its our duty to kick Hezbollah butt back to Iran, I still do not know if our current government leaders have the pure Jewish heart to do it right. Are they fighting Hezbollah this time since they really forgot to carry out the threats we made over the past year to the Palestinians? Was it because that so many had been killed that day including the tank crew that drove a few kilometres into Lebanon in pursuit? If the Hezbollah had merely kidnapped the two soldiers, would we be pursuing them now? Are we attacking them and Lebanon to show them who's boss? Will we go far enough, will we go too far?

Or are we attacking them and setting the high objectives of not stopping until the return of the two soldiers and distancing the terrorist from the border in order to glorify Hashem's name that has been disgraced by over six years of his nation being held hostage by these yishmaelim?

Are we attacking Lebanon in order to be able to carry out more retreats? I've been trying to give Olmert a lot of zchut in the past week, but having him make the idiotic and humiliating remarks in Nitzan earlier this week is not helping.

If Olmert, Peretz, and Halutz are fighting the war to prove they have balls that we all accused them of not having during the past year and elections, then we are in big trouble.

BUT, for whatever reason that motivates them, A) may they do tshuva ASAP, B) may our prayers to God to give them strong backs continue, and C) may God exploit them to lead us to complete victory over all our enemies and geulah shlema.

Anonymous said...

If I've already started and have no one else to talk to say late at night, then let me just vent a bit more. Even though I don't know how far we need to go, I am really worried that some third party will be motivated to join in when they see Hezbollah on its knees, and God forbid we talk and rave about how our strong army and brave soldiers did it themselves, because we already know that we got the Yom Kippur War as a direct outcome from our Six Day War 'cohi votzem yedi' pride.

That's also why we are now praying hard for God's mercy and that we all need to do tshuva fast.

I know that e v e r y t h i n g is for the better, but I really don't want to live through another holocaust before things get better.

Anonymous said...

Honestly, I almost wish the Arab world, or Iran WOULD get involved, I am a bit tired of this tough talk then no walk, and tired of us pissing around and popping 5 terrorists here 10 there.
having Europe and the UN run Neville Chamberlain interference, if this is going to be WWII, the know what, lets go. Open invitation to jihadis, give us a reason, you want to wipe Israel off map, quit hiding behind babies and give it your best shot, hate us US infidels, come on bro, let's go. Honestly give us a good reason to say "Fuck this shit" "screw your mosques, your corrput imams, your religeon of peace shit while you fund terrorists, you know what you want armageddon, fine, but before you moslems go there, take two trips, go visit Dresden in Germany and Hiroshima. Look for a building over 60 years old.

In World Wars, we the descendants of apes and pigs are two for two.

Anonymous said...

I watch what is going on and I see that your enemies are sure that they are winning .
The real questions are :
can you win ?
are you going to win?
How serious your desire to fight?

I would really appreciate you insight

Anonymous said...

Anonymous,
it depends on the context your question is asked.

In the short term, we (regular people) really have no clue what our leaders want and if they are acting for the good of the nation or themselves. The question is not really if we can win (yes) and if we are going to win (this battle? I dunno), but so far dissent in Israel is limited to a tiny minority of extreme left-wing bleeding hearts. (You have noticed by now that the left and right wing are united which usually means bad news for our enemies).

Now whatever happens in the short term and what pressure the US and the world puts on us, let's put it this way: It is our destiny to win. The descendants of Eisav and Yishmael might be able to make us suffer over the span of a few thousands years, but in the end, we know that we will build our third temple (guess where?) and that they will kiss our feet. We've been saying fo a long time now, better to join us than be against us because the reward is great.