Despite the political posturing and the promises of a peace through withdrawal, UNIFIL observers in South Lebanon point out that the fight in the South is far from over. 

UNIFIL (United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon) itself is a misnomer. The ‘interim’ force came to the region in 1978 to secure the safety of south Lebanese civilians and ensure the withdrawal of the IDF as per UN Security Council resolution 425  but has since become a permanent fixture of Lebanese life. The UNIFIL officers are experts in their own field as they observe, first hand, the contradictions between the Israeli peace offers in letter and the Israeli military actions. They are suspicious of Barak’s promises of a ‘complete withdrawal’ from Lebanon, and assert that anything less than a complete 
withdrawal may result in an escalation of violence in the region.

Hizbollah, for its part, plays an important and decisive part in the conflict in the South. Academics and researchers agree that Hizbollah accounts for most of the military resistance activities against Israel in the occupation zone. "Almost 95% of all resistance activity in the South is organized and carried out by the Islamic Resistance cell of Hizbollah," asserts Professor Hamzeh. The Hizbollah’s Islamic Resistance cell is not an enormous army, but an elite guerrilla warfare unit. At most, researchers concede, it consists of an operational fighting unit of 300 highly motivated men who are extremely familiar with the terrain of their operations and experts at guerrilla warfare. 

These guerrilla teams work within groups of usually not more than five or six, and specialize in laying down booby-traps or organizing ambushes. Another common tactic now is multi-pronged frontal attacks on SLA and IDF positions, with one Hizbollah party laying down suppressive mortar fire from a few kilometers away while another, armed with small arms and wire guided anti-tank weapons, charges right up to the enemy picket or bunker. These frontal attacks have served the Hizbollah well in demoralizing the SLA and often result in surrendering of the picket and appropriating of SLA prisoners. The captured SLA prisoners are usually handed over to Lebanese government for treason trials or exchanged with the enemy in return for Hizbollah prisoners or Shia detainees held in Israeli run detention centers and prisons in South Lebanon. 

The booby traps and ambushes are conducted after reliable information pinpoints the time and areas of IDF or SLA movements. Consisting of modes of operation ranging from roadside bombs to booby-trapped buildings, these tactics are highly effective in chalking up kills or injuries on IDF or SLA regulars. It is mostly the steady loss of life and consistent injuries among Israeli soldiers in such resistance traps and ambushes that has built up pressure from within Israel to withdraw troops completely from the occupied areas of Lebanon.

While Barak continues to hold forward promises of withdrawal, Hizbollah refuses to let the pressure up and has, since Barak’s taking over in July 1999, maintained a steady pressure on the IDF and SLA, averaging about one attack a week. These attacks are resulting in higher casualties among the South Lebanon Army militia as the IDF seeks to distance itself from the real fighting.

"The main question is what happens to the de-facto forces such as the SLA," says Col. Guru Saday Batabyal, Commanding Officer of the Indian UNIFIL Battalion (INDBATT), "These are the people who have collaborated with Israel against their country, and it is to be seen what kind of amnesty their country gives them and how they are rehabilitated." 

The Indian Gorkha battalion oversees peacekeeping in an area totally occupied by Israeli troops. In fact, it is the only battalion area that actually shares the border with Israel itself and it totally cut off from other UNIFIL areas. In times of conflict, when Israel shuts its areas down, the INDBATT Gorkhas are often cut off from fresh supplies and have to go many days on stored camp supplies alone. 

Locally, the biggest challenge INBATT soldiers face is to enforce the strict rules against traffic of armed elements within their areas by effectively manning checkpoints and observation posts. It is at such checkpoints and posts that they often face confrontation with the local people. However, the Gorkhas have tried to win over the hearts of the locals by providing efficient and hassle free administration of such measures. Col. Batabyal orders his soldiers to keep waiting period at checkpoints under five minutes. Mjr. Pradeep Poonia provides free veterinary care to the villagers and Mjr. Jaideep Sengupta is the only dentist in the area. Indian soldiers from the Army Medical Corps and Military Nursing Services provide free medical care, while all hands help in activities at local schools. 

"When we first came here we faced some problems as the local community wanted to test us," says Col. Batabyal, "But we have been able to show them that we come from a long tradition of a strong professional army."

According to Col. Batabyal, the possibility of trouble within INDBATT areas is limited to that from disgruntled SLA militia men who suffer from "low morale" because they are not sure of whether they will get asylum in Israel, will be pardoned by the Lebanese government, or will be thrown in jail or even killed in retribution once Israeli troops leave.

In general the UNIFIL troops face violence on two fronts - the Israelis, represented by the IDF and SLA; and the Resistance forces, represented by the Hizbollah and Amal. In trying to keep the peace in the assigned area of UN control, the UNIFIL peacekeepers have to convince all sides concerned on the need to refrain from engaging in a widespread conflict that would disrupt public life and lead to a massacre of civilians. It is a tough task, especially as one side sees it as their inalienable legal right and religious decree to resist occupation, and the other sees it as their political and military duty to safeguard the occupation. 

"No dignified person will accept occupation of his land without resistance, nor will he accept any hindrance in his retaliation," says Abdallah Hussieni , an opinion leader living in the Finnish UNIFIL area. Hussieni left Lebanon early in the civil war in 1976, and returned to his village in South Lebanon in 1989. Living within the FINBATT area of operations for ten years he is skeptical of both, the promises of peace and the role of the U.N.

"The basic problem here is Israel," he asserts, "During the 1996 Grapes of Wrath operation this house was shot up… More than 150 shells landed here on this mountain… Since 1948 we have been used to getting only destruction from Israel." 

Hussieni, a 'religious' Shia who now runs a gas station and acts as a local opinion leader, believes that the UNIFIL peacekeepers should not be interfering with the resistance operations. "By staying here we are participating in the resistance, we part of the resistance," he explains, "They (UNIFIL) have been here for over twenty years but I think they have not understood us… We are passing through their barricades and see that they have turned them into military camps, this is don’t understand… Are they afraid of us? If Amal and Hizbollah don’t approve of UNIFIL they can take any position within 24 hours, so their (UNIFIL) hassling us won’t do any good… We don’t like them to act as a military force but as witnesses of peace. We are the ones who are the victims here but sometimes the UNIFIL treats us like we are the killers. We are not, we are the victims."

However, while Hussieni wants UNIFIL to tone down its operations some new residents would like to see them be more proactive in protecting the civilians. Hani Tawbe is a Shia who left his village, also in the FINBATT area, in 1965 and went to Australia. He visited every couple of years till 1985 when the war in the South took a turn for the worse. He recently returned with his wife, Brenda, and is working on constructing his new house in the old village. 

Problem - the house overlooks a wadi that separates the FINBATT area from the Israeli occupied villages, with Beaufort castle visible far on the horizon. Hani and Brenda often watch Israeli jets fly around their wadi and drop bombs that come "frighteningly close."

"The Finns call that area the end of the world and I don’t want to be on that boundary," admits Hani in a soft rolling Sydney drawl that continues to color his English. "This is the area of trouble," Hani waves across the wadi from his newly constructed balcony, "I was planning to build a house out there but then had to squeeze myself in here as that place was not safe."

Hani’s wife Brenda, originally from England, has taken a liking to the village life and enjoys watching the sunrise in the valley every morning. "I feel very welcome and the people are friendly and hospitable," she offers. But she too admits that the going gets rough at times. "About five weeks back the troubles were on," she recalls, "There was a lot of bombing and it was very frightening. The planes (Israeli jets) still fly bye… all the time. Yesterday we saw smoke go up in the wadi from bombs, they came very close. We could feel the vibrations inside our home."

Hani is not active in the village or local politicking, his decision to return to Lebanon is more sentimental and personal. "I don’t talk politics too much," admits Hani, "And what I believe I keep to myself. Just because I live in the same village doesn’t mean that I should follow everyone else. I grew up in a western culture so we talk about what we can do for ourselves and not what the politicians can do." 

Hani and Brenda would like to see more, not less, of the UNIFIL peacekeepers. "We need more contact between the U.N. and the village," asserts Hani, "It is a safety issue. At least they could (when they) drive a tank in here tell the people we are not going to die. They make us more scared than we are." 

The ‘tanks’ Hani is disturbed by are Finnish Armored Personnel Carriers (APCs) that the FINBATT uses to aggressively patrol the area of its operations, night and day. The FINBATT area is dissected neatly in half between that occupied by Israel and that administered by Lebanon. This makes it a ‘hot’ area, with frequent exchange of artillery fire between the IDF, SLA and the resistance groups. This is also an area susceptible to the laying of mines and roadside bombs by both sides.

Sometimes, the Finns themselves are caught in the midst of the fighting. On July 19, 1999, five 155 mm artillery rounds fired by Israeli guns landed on a Finn UNIFIL observation post - OP 9-33. The soldiers present at the post that day escaped unhurt by hiding in the bomb shelters. The IDF claimed to have been engaging resistance groups in the region. 

"Just a few minutes earlier AEs (armed elements) were firing from Kaprika on IDF positions," recalls Warrant Officer (WO III) Juho Poyhtari , who was commanding post 9-33 that day. "Kaprika is about 1500 meters from here… We heard some bombing but didn’t notice it."

Minutes later IDF artillery shells landed on OP 9-33, sending Juho and his soldiers scurrying for cover. Wouldn’t the IDF have known that Kaprika was 1500 meters away and that the position they were firing at was a U.N. observation post? Does the IDF even know that OP 9-33 exists?

"Yes," says Juho, smilingly sheepishly, "They know we are here." Juho refuses to affirm if the IDF deliberately fired on their post in retaliation for the Kaprika incident. Juho is a reservist who plans to complete his remaining two months of duty and then return home to go back to college and "start studying." 

Four Finn UNIFIL troops have died in South Lebanon since 1982, and in the first six months of 1999 they were engaged in 51 clashes and fired upon 34 times.

"We have to remember we are in their home area," says Col. Jukka Haaksiala, Commanding Officer of the Finnish UNIFIL Battalion (FINBATT). "We have been able to minimize the friction by using diplomacy," he adds, "And if there is a minute problem we usually contact the local mayor or mukhtar or the Lebanese Army who help explain that we are doing important work here."

If the Israeli troops opt for a partial withdrawal out of South Lebanon, and some experts feel this may well be the case, they will create half-occupied areas, much like FINBATT, within all UNIFIL area of operations, opening up the possibility that the peacekeepers will face a more violent conflict situation over the next year.

Most local analysts agree that the Israeli withdrawal from the South is going to be carried out only after Israel makes its peace with Syria next year. If both, the Israelis and the Syrians, opt for a full withdrawal then they would leave behind a highly unstable political environment. The Hizbollah, which owes most of its hard-line allegiance to the Iranian clergy lead by Ayatollah Ali Khameini, is curtailed in its political ambitions within Lebanon by the Syrians who brokered the civil war and have run a de-facto government here since 1990. The Shia community, now the majority community in Lebanon, is split evenly between the fundamentalist Hizbollah and the secular but somewhat corrupt Amal - both enjoy the support of one-third of the Shia community. It is the control of the remaining third that is up for grabs if Syria withdraws as a part of a peace deal with Israel. Lebanon’s highly divided population, hailing from 18 different confessions, each with its own distinct religious, economic and political interests, has been forced into peace under the heavy hand of Syrian collaboration and the threat of Israeli occupation. Whether these communities will observe peaceful means of resolving their disputes after the Syrians and Israeli leave is debatable.

"These are not nice people, all are smugglers," notes an NCO posted at an observation post in Chebaa, "They have spent all their lives as criminals, and at the first sign of disagreement they come out their homes with guns and start shooting at each other."

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U.N. Resolution 425 ? Issued by the United Nations Security Council after the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1978, calls for unconditional withdrawal of Israeli troops from all of Lebanese territory.

From a personal interview with Col. Guru Saday Batabyal, CO, INDBATT HQ, Ebel es-Saqi (Israeli Occupied Lebanon), July 1999.

From a personal interview with Abdallah Hussieni, South Lebanon, July 1999.

From a personal interview with Hani and Brenda Tawbe, South Lebanon, July 1999.

From a personal interview with WO (III) Juho Poyhtari, FINBATT Observation Post 9-33, South Lebanon, July 1999.

From a personal interview with Col. Jukka Haaksiala, CO, FINBATT HQ, South Lebanon, July 1999.