An Israeli airstrike on the Hezbollah stronghold of Dahiyeh in southern Beirut reportedly killed senior Hezbollah commander Ibrahim Aqil, head of the terrorist group’s elite Radwan unit. The USA lengthy had sanctioned Aqil for his function within the kidnapping and homicide of Individuals and had provided a reward for info resulting in his seize. Particularly, the US believed Aqil to be concerned within the 1983 bombings of each the U.S. Embassy in Beirut and the Marine Barracks that collectively killed greater than 300 Individuals.
The query is, why didn’t the US kill Aqil earlier than Israel? In spite of everything, the Marine Barracks bombing was the deadliest assault on Individuals till the September 11, 2001, Al Qaeda assaults.
Israel needed Aqil lifeless for various causes. He actively plotted the homicide of Israelis and coordinated carefully with Iran to import weaponry to attain that objective. Actually, Israel knew about Aqil’s basic whereabouts for weeks, if not months or longer. They tracked him and knew the assorted residences he frequented.
Both the US had that info, or it didn’t. If it didn’t, that exposes an intelligence hole that William Burns, director of Central Intelligence Company, ought to clarify earlier than Congress. If the U.S. intelligence neighborhood did know Aqil’s location, nonetheless, the query then turns into why the US didn’t act and the ramifications of that failure.
The issue with George W. Bush’s “International Battle on Terror” is that terrorism is a only a tactic employed to additional an agenda. At its core, there’s a cost-benefit evaluation: Does the assault additional the objective and is the associated fee value it?
When Ronald Reagan ordered U.S. forces to evacuate Lebanon after the bombings, Hezbollah leaders concluded that terror labored. So did Al Qaeda chief Osama Bin Laden, who cited the Beirut withdrawal as proof that his technique might power the US to decouple itself from Saudi Arabia.
Reagan’s willingness to commerce arms for hostages solely compounded the issue by convincing terrorists that hostage-taking might pay dividends. Sure, hostages got here dwelling however no sooner had Iran acquired the final load of spare elements for its battle effort in opposition to Iraq than Hezbollah seized new hostages.
There was a street not taken by Reagan or his successors. Had the US hunted down each perpetrator concerned within the 1983 Beirut bombings, not solely wouldn’t it have avenged American deaths, nevertheless it additionally would have signaled that there’s a very excessive price related to killing Individuals. This isn’t merely a principle. Think about what the KGB did when Lebanese terrorists kidnapped Russian diplomats: “The Soviet secret police final 12 months secured the discharge of three kidnapped Soviet diplomats in Beirut by castrating a relative of a radical Lebanese Shia Muslim chief, sending him the severed organs after which capturing the relative within the head.” Maybe such in-your-face brutality just isn’t America’s type, however a focused killing by cruise missile or drone would convey the identical level. Had Reagan, George H.W. Bush, or Invoice Clinton ordered everybody concerned within the 1983 bombings or subsequent hostage-taking killed, maybe Bin Laden too would have reconsidered whether or not the US was actually as weak as he concluded.
The difficulty stays related in the present day. Iran has engaged in a brazen scheme to grab Individuals and ransom them for billions of {dollars}. Each Presidents Barack Obama and Joe Biden have been too keen to pay the value and maintain the cycle alive.
If as a substitute of rewarding hostage-takers the US killed them, the possibility that terror leaders would count on reward for future kidnappings would diminish precipitously.
The USA ought to applaud Israel for eliminating Aqil. That he survived for 40 years after the 1983 bombings, nonetheless, is an affront to justice and the reminiscence of these American diplomats and peacekeepers killed whereas attempting to deliver Lebanon a greater future.