Daily Alert Archives

Countdown to Conflict: Hizballah's Military Buildup and the Need for Effective Disarmament

[Institute for Contemporary Affairs-Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs] Brig. Gen. (res.) Dr. Shimon Shapira - It is vitally important to implement the relevant articles of UN Security Council Resolution 1701 regarding the disarmament of Hizballah. Unfortunately, this obligation, also contained in Resolution 1559 from 2004, is the subject of a plan which, according to Resolution 1701, is to be developed in the next month by the UN secretary-general and implemented at a later date. In the meantime, Hizballah has stated that it refuses to disarm. This situation elevates the importance of an embargo on supplying Hizballah with weapons, as called for in the UN resolution. However, there has been no decision to deploy a special force that would supervise the embargo on the Syrian-Lebanese border and in the Lebanese seaports and airports. Right now, Resolution 1701 just calls on Lebanon to secure its borders; UNIFIL may assist the Lebanese government if requested. The resolution also only calls on states to refrain from selling weaponry to Hizballah, but does not authorize any state to enforce an arms embargo. What is necessary is the establishment of special forces that will carry out this mission of monitoring the entry-points into Lebanon. Given the huge amounts of Iranian weaponry that were delivered to Hizballah in the past six years, this is a glaring inadequacy in the resolution. The writer is a senior research associate at the Institute for Policy and Strategy at the Lauder School of Government, Diplomacy and Strategy of the Interdisciplinary Center Herzliya.
2006-08-21 01:00:00
Full Article