The 2006 War: A Turning Point in Middle East History

A Guerra de 2006: Uma Virada na História do Oriente Médio

A versão em português do texto segue, como de hábito, após a versão inglesa.

Photo by Charbel Karam on Unsplash

It was the 12th of July 2006. I got a call in the middle of the morning and was told, by an excited voice, that something big had happened in Lebanon; there had been a Hezbollah - not named by the caller, but it was understood - operation against an Israeli patrol.

From that moment on, and for the next 33 days, it would be virtually impossible to pay attention to anything else in the world. In part, of course, this was because of family and friends in Lebanon whose lives were truly permanently at risk. But I dare say, there was something more profound, more fundamental, that bestowed on those 33 days of war a historical significance for the region and a deep psychological dimension for me and, I believe, for millions of Arabs and Muslims throughout the world.

Once again, Lebanon, and by extension the whole of the Arab world, were faced with the prospect of a new devastating defeat at the hands of the Israeli army; with the revival of the sense of impotence that had been consolidated for over a century of historical setbacks.

And this is what we were promised by Israel and the United States, from the very first day. The fairly limited operation undertaken by Hezbollah fighters, an attack on a military Israeli patrol and the capture of two of its soldiers, would be followed by open war, a war that intended nothing less than the total destruction of the Islamic Resistance in Lebanon (Hezbollah).