War, Assassination, and Moral Calculus
As I can’t currently comment on the site during the day, I struck up a conversation/debate with Mike at the Big Stick via email about my Dubai assassination post. Mark eventually got in on the act and we thought that the back and forth was good enough to post here for your review.
Scott: I can’t respond to your comments on the site because I no longer have access to the League from work. But if it would be of interest to you, I’d be happy to have a bit of an email exchange to explore things further. I’ve got some work to which I need to attend this morning, but I’d be happy to fire back an initial response to you comment a little later. Let me know if that is of interest.
Mike: Sure Scott – fire away.
Scott: This is less in depth than I had hoped for, but the long and the short of my post can be summed up as follows:
- I’m not condemning Israel, I identified that I was not prepared to forgo the conclusion that Mahmoud al-Mabhouh deserved to die and that the Mossad were the right folks to do it,
- I worry that using tactics like assassination leave us feeling less morally culpable,
- I feel like we ought to be wracked with every bit as much doubt, uncertainty, and moral consternation over the decision to assassinate someone as we are when deciding whether or not to engage in conventional warfare, granted over different dynamics,
- And that a belief that it does as a tactic does leave us less morally culpable in terms of state sanctioned violence can and in this case seems to have lead to an attitude that is counter-rpoductive to actually ending the conflict in question.
In terms of your Hitler example, believing that Hitler should have been assassinated does not absolve us from a critical analysis of the use of assassination as an acceptable tactic in all future instances, which is, really, all I’m calling for.
Mike: I’m more inclined to say that it makes us more morally culpable. When we’re talking about general war quite often the higher-ups are insulated from the decision making. How often does the President or the Sec. of Defense get a call asking permission to fire a rocket at a Taliban position or lob a grenade into a cave where bad guys are hiding? On the flip side, when you arrange for an assassination somebody pretty high up the food chain has to say, “Yes, I want you to kill this man”. To me that’s what makes it real for them.
I also think, as many commenters pointed out, that assassination is actually better because there’s no collateral damage. One target, one dead. If you’re going to wage war, they should all be fought that way.
Scott: The collateral damage argument is probably the strongest in this case, certainly. That’s why I acknowledged it vis-a-vis Sullivan’s comments.
That being said, choosing to assassinate someone as opposed to engaging in conventional warfare with a group someones doesn’t leave me with nothing in the pit of my stomach, just a different something and, in many regards, of equal weight. But let’s not walk around acting as if there is nothing in the pits of our stomachs because, this time, we chose to assassinate someone.
It is still a decision that we should be torn up about and the likelihood that any conflict in the foreseeable future will shift to solely assassinations of strictly military targets as opposed to general warfare seems pretty dim to me.
Mike: Of course it is a dim possibility but we can dream.
As for ill-feelings caused by assassinations, I actually have little or no problem with them. Hamas does very bad things. They target civilians. I’m glad to see this leader removed from the planet. On the other hand, a Hamas militant who is shot while throwing rocks at Israeli soldiers…that saddens me because often those are just young kids caught up in a bigger thing than themselves.
This may again go back to American sympathies being greatly different than Canadian ones. You will recall that you received some pretty stern feeback from both conservatives and liberals on your post awhile back that theorized bringing a gun to a rally was a sign of our violent American culture (I’m over-simplifying your position here – but you get my point). Americans in general are pretty okay with assassinations of shady individuals. Those kinds of actions are what sells movie tickets and Vince Flynn novels and keeps 24 on the air.
Scott: Could be.
But if your end point is to boil all of this down some kind of cultural relativism, then it seems like something of a waste and really just bailing on a difficult conversation.
I’m not suggesting you need to feel bad for the Hamas official who was assassinated as a person. I don’t have all of the information on him, but odds are he was a deplorable human being. But that doesn’t mean that you can’t recognize that the decision to assassinate someone ought not to cause fairly serious consternation as a matter of principle.
The practicalities of the situation are going to win out for most folks (less collateral, bad man), but the principles of the situation (enabling a powerful entity like the state free reign on killing human beings without the check of public due process), I think, ought to at least weight heavily on us as well.
Mike: I think you tend to over-complicate things Scott. In my experience, quite often cultural relativism trumps most other human impulses. It’s certainly the building block of Israeli foreign policy after experiencing the Holocaust.
Now if you’re worried about how much thought takes place prior to these decisions – i’m sure there is plenty. But it is much more of the logistical variety (“Do I bring the 9mm too or just the .22″) than the moral uncertainty kind. Simply, if you declare a group or certain actors to be your enemy that should be the hard part, the moment of moral decision making. Prosecuting a war against said enemy is just follow-through.
Scott: When it comes to giving an entity like a state the power to take another human life, I tend to think there is no such thing as “over-complicated”. And to suggest as such strikes me as a stunning cop out.
That you suggest that the majority of thought over whether to assassinate someone is logistical is precisely the problem to which I am pointing and the attitude you have displayed tells me, I guess, that we at very different ends of the spectrum. People become enemies all the time, but utilizing critical analysis about what then one ought to do simply does not, at least in my mind, end there. I have a hard time seeing suggesting that once you declare someone your “enemy” most-to-all moral calculus as essentially over as much other than willful blindness.
In short, I am inclined to suggest that you are over-simplifying the issue to suit your pre-determined perspective on it. That this seems to be a common enough exercise strikes me as one of the glaring problems with most foreign policy formulations.
Mike: It’s over-complicated in the sense that you keep hammering this point that there should be a great deliberation that accompanies the decision to assassinate and each time that decision is made it should be an agonizing moral dilemma for the parties involved. I’m simply stating that the decision to go to war with the enemy should be the moment of moral hand-wringing. Look at the Powell Doctrine for example.
It states:
A list of questions all have to be answered affirmatively before military action is taken by the United States:
1. Is a vital national security interest threatened?
2. Do we have a clear attainable objective?
3. Have the risks and costs been fully and frankly analyzed?
4. Have all other non-violent policy means been fully exhausted?
5. Is there a plausible exit strategy to avoid endless entanglement?
6. Have the consequences of our action been fully considered?
7. Is the action supported by the American people?
8. Do we have genuine broad international support?
Answering all of those questions is when the morals should be involved (especially #1, #4, #6 and #7). But once we can say yes to all of those questions we go on to the corollary to the Powell Doctrine which states that, “…when a nation is engaging in war, every resource and tool should be used to achieve decisive force against the enemy, minimizing US casualties and ending the conflict quickly by forcing the weaker force to capitulate.” Wouldn’t you agree that assassinations of key opposition leaders qualifies as ‘decisive force’?
What it appears you are looking for Scott is some sign that every time Mossad kills someone the people of Israel will all feel a deep emotional response. You are ignoring the reality that they made their moral decision a long time ago and maybe, just maybe they are at peace with that decision now. Sure, I’m willing to concede that someone at Mossad HQ might have asked for forgiveness from God for ordering a man’s death, just like President Obama may pray for forgiveness every night for commanding a military that kills men and often civilians by accident.
If your worry is over the glibness that t-shirts like the one you showed demonstrate..that’s war. There will always be people who are happy to see their enemies killed and even take joy in it. This is as old as human history. Part of it is also about desensitization, a phenomenon that has also existed for a very long time. It’s how people get through wars. Wanting to inject emotion, apathy and moral uncertainty into every death may be an admirable goal on some level, but it doesn’t help the people involved do the hard work of fighting a war.
Scott: You’re confusing emotion with morality. I have already clearly stated that I’m not suggesting an emotional response is necessary, just a recognition of the morality at play in ordering an assassination, which might be decisive but is not necessarily morally acceptable in all cases.
Mark, I’m curious to get your take on this.
Mark: It’s pugilism – you’re both landing blows, but no cheap shots, although I think you’re talking past each other a bit.
If you’re asking where I come down on the issue, that’s where I wound up running into a dilemma in my response. I’m quite torn on it. On the one hand, I think you’re right to decry the celebration over this coming from some circles.
On the other hand, I have a hard time seeing how this celebration is a new development – I view it as functionally equivalent to the way in which crack warriors – samurai, ninja, knights, etc. – have been celebrated as virtuous over time, just in the age of the T-shirt. Assassinations are also not only surgical, but personal in a way that drone strikes and laser-guided bombs are not. As such, they arguably make us care more about war – this particular assassination of one Indisputably Bad Dude seems to have drummed up far more outcry than the average accidental bombing of an Afghan wedding in addition to drumming up the type of celebration that concerns you.
I think that personal element – despite the surgical nature of assassination – on some level actually does force us to confront what War really is in a way that impersonal attacks do not. The trouble is that when actually faced with what War really is, humans seem to wind up having no problem with it. The near-deification of the assassins coming from some circles is in some sense just a way of expressing that yes, this war is worth fighting. The hue and cry coming from other circles though is likewise just a way of expressing that no, this war is not worth fighting.
When war is fought impersonally, not only do people care less, but those who do are ultimately merely debating methods rather than whether or not the war is worth fighting at all. Personal killings like this, however surgical, bring that core issue much closer to the surface, and force us to put all our cards on the table. The purpose of war is to kill your enemy. Surgical assassinations do exactly that – and only that.
I know the above is quite muddled. That’s because I’m genuinely trying to sort out what I think about this issue. I do know that I think the assassination was an acceptable act of war. What I’m not sure about is what I think about whether the reactions thereto are healthy, merely normal, or outright unhealthy.
Scott: Muddled, sure. But the above is, essentially, all I’m really looking for. A recognition that the act of assassinating someone ought to cause reasonably serious deliberations about moral ramifications of the decision and that making the decision does not let us off the hook of those deliberations anymore than making the decision re:drone attacks just because it is surgical.
We might decide that it is worth it. I think one can make the case that the Dubai assassination was the right thing to do. But it ought not to be a light-hearted affair and the fact that there is and has been a light-hearted reaction to the decision and its outcome does not make that reaction okay or acceptable.
Mike: So how do you recognize it? A public ceremony? A letter to the press expressing regret? What is the mechanism through which that moral recognition is shown which will be adequate for you?
I’m asking this because you can’t tell me with any certainty that there isn’t a moral recognition from the parties involved. Can you tell me how well those Mossad agents sleep at night? What about the Israeli people on whose behalf that assassination was carried out?
I just don’t know what you are looking for Scott. Do you think that the t-shirt proves there is no moral recognition, or is it the absence of some public display that bothers you so much?
Scott: That’s a good question to which I don’t have a pat answer. What I can say is that the t-shirt and the kinds of responses by folks like Marty Peretz leave me concerned that there is a sort of after the fact moral glibness at play that may well point to a similar tendency before the fact. If the response was more akin to Andrew Sullivan’s, “this is an awful thing to do, but ultimately justifiable on numerous levels”, I wouldn’t have written about it. In some senses all we have to go on is the after-the-fact reaction, which is most certainly fallible, but not insignificant either.
What I would suggest, I guess, is that I have larger concern about the kinds of critical analysis that not only go into formulations of foreign policy before the fact, but during, and after the fact in general. Things like the use use and defense of torture, my own country’s potential tacit implication in those kinds of issues in Afghanistan, the response to this assassination, Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo Bay, and the like. These things concern me vis-a-vis foreing policy and I think that they potentially point to the kinds of defficiencies writ large that I’m outlining with regards to this assassination.
I think a failure to continue our moral calculation after the decision that someone is an enemy and we’re at war can and has lead to some horrific things that undermine the very values for which we claim to be fighting and make the world a worse place overall. As you said, this is not a soccer game, it’s war. War is a very serious affair and there have been indications of late that the actions of many participants have not reflected that gravity.
So what I’m really doing here, at best, is shouting about things I see as potentially pointing to that deficiency and asking whether, in light of those things, we’ve thoroughly thought this all the way through because failing to do so has had some demonstrably dire consequences. And I understand that the response might be, “that’s just the way things are,” and that such a response might be accurate. I just happen to find the, “that’s just the way things are,” conclusion unsatisfactory.
I should note, too, that Powell was the great exception to the below description. So you’re invocation of his doctrine is fair. It would more effective it were still the dominant force in US foreign policy, which, as I understand things, it is not.
Mark: Well let me pose this question to you – what, if anything, makes this celebration of Mossad materially different from say the celebration of warriors in the past?
On some level, it’s certainly almost barbaric, but then again doesn’t war require a certain level of barbarism, not just from the soldiers, but also from the population that supports the soldiers? I guess I’m wondering if the lack of serious reflection on this subject isn’t a necessary consequence of a society’s decision to go to war. In order to win a war, a country must be willing on some level to dehumanize the enemy, to view the war as a battle of absolutes, of good vs. evil.
Scott: It’s not necessarily different, per se. But the context in which it occurs, specifically the moral context, is different. And so our response to it necessitates a different calculus.
Mark: I guess I’m not sure I see what you mean by the moral context being different. Is it that the clinical nature of this required in essence a sneak attack? Such attacks have been celebrated in cultures for centuries, whether we are talking about commando raids or the Battle of Trenton.
I should say that I’m quite certain at this point that the positive reception for the assassination is on net a moral evil that, from a libertarian perspective, is also problematic because it is a celebration of the State in all its naked brutality. I’m just wondering if it’s also a necessary evil that must occur if a society is to maintain the determination necessary to fight and win a war.
Scott: I’m saying that the moral context of our actions is not static.
Our terms of morality evolve over time. Actions that were considered morally acceptable in the past are not necessarily morally acceptable in the future. But it’s not a black and white affair, there is nuance. So I’m not saying that State sanctioned vigilante-ism in the form of assassination, if we view those assassins in the historical context as warriors and the celebration of warriors, if not immoral and therefore evil. Rather I am saying that is presents a different moral conundrum than it has in the past that makes the celebration of it less acceptable in a contemporary context.
The moral context of 16th Century Japan is not the same as the moral context of 21st Century Israel/America, and not just on a cultural basis. We understand ourselves and our actions in a different context and therefor apply different analysis and response to them.
Mike: My concern here is that you are choosing the lowest common denominators and focusing on that. That t-shirt is typical of a certain kind of bravado/dark humor that represents a minority here.
I recall going to the gun range when I was a kid and being able to purchase a paper target that had Gaddafi’s face on it. You can also go to gun shows here in the US and find some really redneck tshirts with similar messages. But what % of society is wearing them? That’s why I caution reading too much into these things. That guy carrying the gun at the political rally…he represents a fraction of a % of Americans.
I would liken this kind of stuff to sailors writing messages to Hirohito on Allied bombs before the planes took off. That glibness makes war more palatable. It’s a coping mechanism.
Certainly the decision to remain at war should be constantly re-evaluated, but I still maintain that once you are war, it’s unlikely that the players are going to always feel the level of moral uncertainty or inflection you seem to want more of.
I think the Obama administration would probably rely on it if they had to start a new war. My understanding is that it’s still popular among the military leadership.
Scott: I’ll admit to being overly cautious here. Your criticism is fair. But I think we’ve seen enough wrong perpetrated in the cause of war lately to be a bit overly cautious.
I would add, though, that rather than just base my critique on the shirts, I did go and seek out something more specific in terms of Marty Peretz’s comments. And I would offer that the positions of a Marty Peretz, former assistant professor at Harvard, former owner of The New Republic, and current Editor-and-Cheif of that same publication, are hardly on the fringe.
Seeing the Obama go back to something more akin to the Powell doctrine would be a welcome event. I wonder if Obama isn’t working out his own doctrine, which I would surely be interested in seeing. I have a lot of reservations about his decisions vis-a-vis Afghanistan that has resulted in some harsh criticism, but I still respect the man and would be, at the very least, curious to see what his own stamp of foreign policy formulation would look like.
Mike: I would guess Obama’s policy would rely a bit too heavily on diplomacy and put the bar so high that military action would be almost impossible.
Scott: I wouldn’t be so sure about that. Certainly there would likely be a recalibration back to a greater emphasis on diplomacy, but Obama has proven himself capable of hawk-ish behaviour. His foreign policy rhetoric during the campaign was an equal mix of diplomacy and use of force.
Mike: I don’t think you can win a US presidential election without mentioning a willingness to use force.
Scott: Ha! Fair enough.
26 comments
This discussion has gone on for two posts seemingly accepting the notion at face value that Israel is entitled to carry its war with Hamas wherever in the world it feels inclined to do so, using whatever means, including the forging of multiple third countries’ passports and acting fully without the knowledge of the government where it acts. This is odd, as these questions would seem to be the only things about the action that are particularly noteworthy over and above how Israel conducts itself on its own territory(ies). I’ll grant that we to some extent do the same thing in Pakistan, but it is quite clear that the enemy we fight in Afghanistan uses pakistan as its primary territorial base; by all rights if we are going to prosecute that war it is going to happen in pakistan. Moreover, we have implicit, if tenuous and tacit, permission for most of what we do in Pakistan from the Pakistanis. If this is just intended to be a discussion of tactical means in warfare and is simply taking the Dubai assassination as a case study of one tactic to compare it to others (ie drone warfare, etc.), then okay I guess. As i said, that’s curious, as surely the interesting fact about the Dubai case is precisely its setting and resulting peculiarly illicit status in terms of international relations. If you just want to examine the question of targeted assassination by Mossad or IDF, there are certainly plenty of examples from which to choose occurring on a regular basis.
I realize part of the impetus of the discussion is the celebration that has followed this. I would argue the celebration is itself an emergent phenomenon from the illegal/embarrassing nature of the hit — Marty Peretz hardly even has occasion to express his approval for Israel’s more deadly actions in the territories anymore; he and others do so here precisely in response to the blatantly scandalous nature of this action, and to the incompetence it has exposed at Mossad and the embarrassment it has caused the Israeli government.
North Reply:
March 11th, 2010 at 7:19 am
Well I would have no sympathy for the Israelis if Australia and Britain decided to punish the state for forging their passports and using Australian and British aliases to commit these assassinations. It certainly does to some degree endanger British and Australian citizens abroad and those countries would be well within their rights to respond accordingly. So certainly the Israelis are allowed to harry their enemies abroad but if they do it in a bone headed manner they’re also allowed to suffer any embarrassment and humiliation that comes with it.
In fairness, considering Peretz as representative of Israeli in general isn’t a kind thing to do to that country. The Israelis in Israel actually debate, kvetch and worry about their actions a lot more than Peretz does in his glib certainty. He is TNR’s crazy uncle (he just happens to be its’ crazy rich uncle and if you’re going to have a crazy uncle he might as well be rich).
Michael Drew Reply:
March 11th, 2010 at 7:38 am
They’re not “allowed” to undertake operations using deadly force in the territory of states not party to the conflict. And no, harboring someone involved in a conflict doesn’t make you party to that conflict. Of course, states do this, but they do it covertly precisely because they’re not allowed to do it under the rules of the international system. When you fuck up and get caught, you’re in it. That’s when your partisans start the haughty “Yeah we did it, and we meant to get caught to show just how bad-ass we are and to say that we think we’re justified in doing this king of thing” routine.
Now, when I say partisans I don’t mean to suggest they speak for Israel. I raised Peretz in particular not because I think he speaks for Israel but because his boasting was an explicit spur to these posts, and I believe the reason for his saying what he’s saying in this instance has been missed in them so far. I do think you misunderstand the role he plays at TNR, however.
http://www.prospect.org/cs/articles?article=my_marty_peretz_problem_and_ours
North Reply:
March 11th, 2010 at 8:23 am
Oh yes Michael I agree and if Abu Dabai wants to do something about that they’re also completely within their rights to do so.
And yes I also agree he steered TNR like a drunken madman. I’m still fond of it though.
Michael Drew Reply:
March 11th, 2010 at 8:33 am
The international community would also be within its rights to do something about it as well, whether at Dubai’s request or on its own initiative.
North Reply:
March 11th, 2010 at 8:41 am
Indeed, but of course the various member states of the international community would have a lot of planks to remove from their own eyes before they started taking tweezers to the spec in Israel’s if they want to kvetch about government assassinations of enemies of the state. With that in mind and considering as a model the fallout from say Russia’s assassination of that expatriate in Britain I would calculate that the International community is entitled to… hmmm carry the 2…bupkiss to Israel on the subject of this assassination.
Also if my memory serves I don’t believe Abu Dhabi currently has any formal diplomatic relations with Israel. Are they going to recall their ambassador? They’d have to send one first.
Michael Drew Reply:
March 11th, 2010 at 9:07 am
Well there you’re talking about a row between two P5 members of the Security Council — that could basically have been as big a deal as Britain wanted to make of it. Here, Dubai obviously has little recourse of its own, but it could appeal to the international community (if it had proof) and would have reason to expect a condemnation of some kind. You say they’re entitled to say bupkus… I think you mean likely (as earlier you say I’m right in the preceding comment), and there you’re probably correct. As in the criminal justice system, past miscarriages have no bearing on present matters. You can personally have no regard for the existing institutions that evaluate states’ adherence to international norms, but it remains the case that the only such institutions that exist are those that exist.
North Reply:
March 11th, 2010 at 9:10 am
I’m sympathetic Michael to the principle but I don’t like what that says about our international organizations. When other countries assassinate the world yawns. When Israel assassinates the international system springs into lightning action? It’s the joke of the UN Human rights council all over again.
Michael Drew Reply:
March 11th, 2010 at 9:20 am
I’m not sure. There certainly was outcry about the Russia-Britain thing. The facts were very unclear for a long period of time on that one. I guess I’d need to hear specifics of other cases. Remember, we’re not talking about regimes that kill their own people, or even governments that assassinate terrorists in countries that give rise to the belligerent movements against country #1. This was a one-off killing in a country that, except for the question of this particular person, was at peace with Israel. Also, there has not been and likely will not be any action taken on this at least until the facts are clearer. I’m merely making the point on principle, which you acknowledge. So don’t swing too far into poor-beleaguered-Israel territory here.
North Reply:
March 11th, 2010 at 10:26 am
On the wading into poor beleaguered Israel territory your point is well taken Michael and it’s something I do have to watch out for, thanks.
A minor point or two however:
-Dubai and the UAE are not technically at peace with Israel. Neither the UAE nor Dubai officially recognizes Israel as a state so they do not have formal diplomatic relations with them and I wouldn’t characterize their relationship as necessarily peaceful.
-The US for another example merrily assassinated soviet agents (and vice versa) in third countries for pretty much the entire duration of the cold war and those assassinations were merely over influence. Here we have a country assassinating a man who is in an officially hostile though not belligerent third state while purchasing missiles to hurtle at the countries civilian population. Even on principles I can’t get very exercised.
Michael Drew Reply:
March 11th, 2010 at 9:57 pm
I take your points. There’s different things going on here. Short of being in a state of war, I don’t think a lack of relations between the country changes the legal question — would you support Iran’s right under the international system to do this here? And as I mentioned, past or even present examples of the same misdeeds don’t change the principle at stake. That’s the way to chaos. I think you’re confusing the IR principle with your particular view of the morality of the situation. In terms of the U.S.-U.S.S.R. conflict, the governments of the countries where those things took place were usually satellites of one or other of the powers, which is to say they understood these struggles were going on in their territory. There were probably cases where it wasn’t like that and in theory I guess those cases could fall into the same category. But when the context is a global struggle between the two superpowers with the entire world looking on, I’m not really sure what authority there was to appeal to. The UN was just another stage for that conflict, and most of the world was signed up with one side or the other. I do get your point, but I think it still comes back to saying that because other countries do this, it should slide when Israel does it and gets caught. I still don’t think you’ve cited a specific comparable example where it slid when another country was caught doing the same thing in the same context. Britain, for example, made a major deal of the poisoning of Litvenenko.
Michael Drew Reply:
March 11th, 2010 at 9:11 am
…and in this case (on the assumption Marty Peretz’s views about the facts are sound), those institutions would be right in issuing a condemnation.
Koz Reply:
March 11th, 2010 at 9:14 am
“Well I would have no sympathy for the Israelis if Australia and Britain decided to punish the state for forging their passports and using Australian and British aliases to commit these assassinations.”
Maybe. But it’s not a slam dunk that the Israelis did it.
North Reply:
March 11th, 2010 at 9:16 am
Probably why the Aussis and Brits haven’t done anything except kvetch.
Jaybird Reply:
March 11th, 2010 at 8:17 am
I’d prefer the forging of multiple passports and clandestine actions to, say, blowing up buildings containing high-value targets (as well as women, children, etc).
Hell, if the Israelis and Palestinians immediately started using only these tactics (forging passports, sneaking around, killing only high-value targets), I’d see that as FREAKIN’ AWESOME. I’d start petitioning my government to use Israel/Palestine as an example worth following.
Michael Drew Reply:
March 11th, 2010 at 8:31 am
That’s a perfectly supportable view; I’m just suggesting that the formal international and diplomatic issues here are what makes this case remarkable and so it would be worth addressing them in the moral evaluations. If all the authors agree with the view you just stated that’s fine, but it’d be good to make it explicit.
Jaybird Reply:
March 11th, 2010 at 8:43 am
Please understand, for my part, I’ve been having the Israel/Palestine argument for the last 15 years. The main dynamic I’ve noticed is this:
Palestine does something. Let’s say they smuggle explosive belts into Israel via ambulances. The arguments come back something to the effect of “Well, you have to understand. To be sure. I’m not condoning. There are many dynamics at play. Try to imagine. Truly regrettable.”
Israel does something. Let’s say that they start checking ambulances at checkpoints for smuggled explosive belts. “CAN YOU BELIEVE THAT ISRAEL IS STOPPING AMBULANCES!!! PEOPLE ARE DYING!!! DYING OF HEART ATTACKS!!! DYING OF STROKES!!! DYING DYING DYING DYING!!!!”
If, perhaps, the smuggled bomb belts are brought up, the argument alternates between all-caps and “certainly, to be sure, there were only a few bomb belts”.
One morning, my alarm clock went off and it was set to Stuff White People Like (NPR) and the news was talking about how Israeli soldiers shot an unarmed man as he tried to drive his car through a barricade.
I remembered thinking “wait, what? Unarmed? He was behind the wheel of a car that was ramming through a barricade!”
I’m rambling. Sorry.
I don’t have a dog in this fight. I just look at it and say “which one has free speech, a free press, recognizes gay civil unions, allows medicinal pot, and has semi-legal massage parlors where you can get a handjob?” and if there is one where that is the case, then that’s the one I’m going to root for in the absence of having a dog in the fight.
Though, I’ve gotta tell ya, the whole dynamic of the two exceptionally different standards for the two sides does make me sympathize for the one over the other.
Has anyone else wondered how they got caught in the first place? Maybe I read too many spy novels but I’m kind of surprised they were so sloppy. Maybe they wanted the bad guys to know they were on the hunt?
Maybe the Israelis don’t spend so much time wringing their hands because they unlike some people know that they are at war with people that want to kill them and who aren’t going to bother with the niceties of polite society while trying to do it.
Maybe assassination seems unfair b/c the perp didn’t have a chance to defend himself, so what, neither do the civilians who were killed by the arms this guy helped smuggle. Why shouldn’t Israelis celebrate the death of one of their enemies?
It amazes me that people paint this as a Mossad success. When all the evidence and results are that it was a massive Mossad failure.
Mahmoud al-Mabhouh Was a worm on a hook
A man dying of cancer looking for one last hurrah against his sworn enemy. The bait in a well thought out plan to gather intelligence and spring a strategic level trap on the Mossad.
Mossad was tricked into killing Mahmoud al-Mabhouh
Here is the evidence
1) The Target was Dying of Cancer, we get this from the Pre Written Original Obituary report from his former organisation (not the organisation that was current at the time of his death and who he supposedly went to Dubai for) and that they past on that information within 24 hours of the report of his death and before his new organisation could counter it and prevent the fact of his long term illness leaking into the news:
http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=255640
2) I also point out he booked his ticket over the Internet in his own name knowing it would show up on Mossad’s surveillance and also as was reported by the Dubai Police that he travelled on his own passport:
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,587044,00.html?test=latestnews
Also reported in the Jerusalem Post and various other Israeli News papers, as well as the Western media and Gulf news papers:
3) Most of those same articles also point out: he talked to his family in Gaza about the trip over the phone knowing their phone lines were tapped by the Mossad as does this one from the UAE.
http://www.thenational.ae/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20100131/FOREIGN/701309828/1002
5) That he had arranged for his wife to phone him at that hotel at a specific time as was reported by the Dubai Police as being the trigger for the hotel staff to break in to his hotel. Thus specifying a time line when Mossad could kill him.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1146911.html
6) In all the videos, this experienced agent of Hamas with three previous attempts on his life by Israel successfully beaten and supposedly training in counter surveillance from nation states; he the target employed no counter surveillance what so ever:
http://www.youtube.com/profile?user=dubaisesslon&annotation_id=annotation_425824
7) The target also traveled without his usual bodyguards, despite at least three previous attempts to assassinate him by Israel:
http://www.thenational.ae/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20100131/FOREIGN/701309828/1002
The discovery that the two Palestinian Mossad assets, turn out to be, a former Gaza FATA PA Policeman who’s family is still in Gaza and had been living in exile in Dubai after being accused of being a Mossad spy. And then his Brother who has been living in Gaza until recently, suddenly turns up and joins him to suddenly also become a Mossad asset, all a short while before the Target conveniently presents himself.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/middle_east/article7034183.ece
9) Then after the event the Two Palestinian assets are the only ones captured within 24 hours mind you, there is no film of them and they are scooted away to the UAE. There is much confusion about this where both FATA and Hamas say they are members of the opposite group.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/middle_east/article7034183.ece?token=null&offset=12&page=2
And then the evidence was gathered and released in a controlled fashion by an impeccable witness. Using Dubai to conduct, what IMHO was a counter Mossad operation; was a master stroke. Most of the leg work could be done by electronic means and by a western trained police force.
The indisputable fact that Dubai police in the speed it reacted to a single assassination; beat both the US FBI, CIA, NSA and police in the speed it got information on the 9/11 suspects; and MI5 and Scotland Yard on the London 7/7 bombing suspects; yet this remarkable feat has never been remarked on by anyone.
I give no evidence for this last point but ask for you to examine your own credulity on the matter.
IMHO the Dubai Police have been fed the evidence to suit another parties needs.
Like I said IMHO Mahmoud al-Mabhouh Was a worm on a hook
A man dying of cancer looking for one last hurrah against his sworn enemy. The bait in a well thought out plan to gather intelligence and spring a strategic level trap on The Mossad.
Now let us look at the results:
Tactical moves by the Mossad that I think were made with clear goals in mind were:
1) Kill the Target [?]
2) Escape the Country [?]
Strategic moves by the Mossad that I think were made with clear goals in mind were:
1) Maintain Mossad’s targeted killings strategy. [?]
2) Maintain political deniability [X]
3) Use the “policy of ambiguity” to supplement political deniability while hinting at implacable state retribution [X]
Tactical moves by the force Inimical to Israel that I think were made with clear goals in mind were:
1) Choose the time and location on which the operation will take place. [?]
2) Control and pollute the Mossad intelligence stream. [?]
3) Gather detailed intelligence and records of Mossad’s methods, Tradecraft and cover companies like Payoneer. [?]
4) Negate all the agents involved, including those at the cover companies now named in the US, Germany, Austria and Switzerland, as well as busting those cover companies, even the agents and assets not identified by Dubai police are now useless, you cannot be sure the other side has not got the identities of those that are not named. [?]
5) Conduct a successful counter operation to a Mossad targeted killing operation. [?]
6) Create a Hamas martyr from a man who was dying anyway [?]
7) Control the release of information for maximum effect [?]
Strategic moves by the force Inimical to Israel that I think were made with clear goals in mind were:
1) Isolate Israel from Dubai by luring Mossad into action on Dubai’s Soil. [?]
2) Isolate Israel from Allies by filming the whole event and capturing Israel’s use of Allies Passports.[?]
Mossad’s habit of cloning passports from not unfriendly nations has a long history and was a predictable aspect. 25 year ago it caused a big problem when UK passports were used and Israel was forced to promise not to do it any more. Ditto the poison in the ear the use of Canadian passports, and the more recent New Zealand passports case where New Zealand withdrew all senior diplomatic relations. Israeli Governments have fallen in the past as a result of less than this. IMHO this time it is worse as several nations are affected at the same time.
3) Get Mossad and Israel castigated by the whole world, such that Ambassadors get quizzed and carpeted. [?]
4) Tarnish the reputation of Mossad by making them appear Amateurish [?]
5) Reduce public Trust of Mossad within Israel. [?]
6) Cause Mossad’s trust of its assets to be knocked and questioned within Mossad. [?]
10) Mossad’s targeted killings operation gets called into question and possibly put on hold. [?]
11) Cause Israel to suffer sanctions and costs at the hands of formerly friendly nations.[?]
12) Reduce Israel’s international political capital at a strategic moment in time. [?]
You could argue that a portion or indeed all of these strategic and tactical elements were accidental and not intended but their effect remains the same Mossad the supposed ultra spies have been beaten and suffered catastrophic damage.
Michael Drew Reply:
March 12th, 2010 at 5:25 am
[!]
North Reply:
March 12th, 2010 at 6:15 am
Very interesting points. If it makes Bibi’s clown government fall in Israel it may well be quite helpful for the peace process.
‘Even as Mr. Netanyahu met with Mr. Obama at a session during which the White House pointedly withheld the usual trappings of a visit by the head of a government, Israel’s other ally, Britain, expelled an Israeli diplomat. It was a rare move by a friendly government, meant as a rebuke for what appeared to be the use of a dozen fake British passports by assassins suspected of being Israeli agents in the killing of a Hamas official in Dubai.
‘“Such misuse of British passports is intolerable,” the British foreign secretary, David Miliband, said in the House of Commons. “The fact that this was done by a country which is a friend only adds insult to injury.”’
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/24/world/middleeast/24diplo.html?hp
Nevertheless:
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/24/world/middleeast/24diplo.html?hp