Publications

The Second Lebanon War was waged simultaneously on two fronts: the military front in southern Lebanon, where IDF forces fought in Hizbollah strongholds, and the civilian fronts deep inside Lebanon and Israel, where civilians served as combat targets for both sides. This represented a new height in the trend that has been emerging for some time, whereby the focus of the fighting in the ongoing Arab-Israeli conflict transfers from a direct clash between armed forces to a mixed pattern, in which the role of civilians on both sides is increasingly central. The assumption underlying this trend is that in an asymmetrical war, in which one of the sides is militarily inferior to the other, striking against the civilian front has a major impact on the balance of power. The fact that this approach was embraced by the weak, in this case Hizbollah, is self-understood. Having no chance of defeating the clearly stronger side, it could only turn to exerting pressure on the civilian front, the one that has been perceived as the weak link. Interestingly, the stronger side too, in this case Israel, has followed suit, suggesting that military pressure on civilian targets is accepted as an important strategic lever.