Israel Threatens to Decimate Lebanon

JERUSALEM -- Three senior Israeli military commanders have threatened to decimate Lebanon's infrastructure with disproportionate firepower, wipe out villages in the south from where they believe attacks on Israel originate and to treat both the Lebanese government and the entire country as the enemy not just Hezbollah, in the next war.

In an interview Friday with the Israeli daily Yediot Ahronot, GOC Northern Command Gadi Eisenkot presented his "Dahiyeh Doctrine." This doctrine would allow the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) to expand its destructive power beyond what it demonstrated two years ago against the Beirut suburb or, dahiyeh in Arabic, a Hezbollah stronghold, during the Second Lebanon War.

"We will wield disproportionate power against every village from which shots are fired on Israel, and cause immense damage and destruction. From our perspective, these are military bases," he said. "This isn't a suggestion. This is a plan that has already been authorized," he added.

During the 2006 war, well over 1,000 Lebanese, the vast majority of them civilian, were killed by Israeli firepower. Simultaneously, over 100 Israelis were killed, the majority of them military personnel, by Hezbollah missile fire into northern Israel.

Human Rights Watch in New York accused Israel of using disproportionate force against civilians and deliberately targeting Lebanese villages in the south, and disputed Israeli claims that Hezbollah fighters had used the villages as bases, stating that in the majority of cases the group had launched attacks from areas outside of the villages. More