Besides destroying Hezbollah, Israel, at the behest of the United States, was going to help reshape the Middle East. Now that Iraq was under American military occupation and most of the other significant Arab states had become subservient to America's imperial designs, the plan was to force Iran and Syria to toe the line.

US strategists had thought that this could be achieved through the destruction of Hezbollah and Lebanon. Hence the Dresden-like bombing of the Lebanese villages and towns -- more than 1000 bombardments in the first 24 hours of the invasion alone -- by US supplied warplanes. The goal was to set Lebanon's destruction as an example and to send a clear message to the Iranians, the Arabs and others: Look what will happen to you if you dare challenge the supremacy of Israeli-US alliance.

Olmert came to power with the pledge that he was going to set the final boundaries of Israel by unilaterally withdrawing from certain parts of the occupied territories leaving a Bantustan-like Palestinian state in the rest of the territories which would be completely at the mercy of Israel. By destroying Hezbollah and Lebanon, Olmert wanted to demonstrate the power of US-Israel alliance and to send a warning to the Palestinians that they must accept whatever is given to them; otherwise they will face similar destruction.

No doubt, Lebanon has suffered badly. Leaving aside the loss of an unknown number of Hezbollah fighters, more than a thousand Lebanese civilians have been killed, a million have been displaced, many villages and towns have been flattened, entire infrastructure of Beirut have been reduced to rubbles, numerous roads, bridges, power plants have been destroyed, yet Israel has failed to destroy Hezbollah. It has survived the combined Israeli-US military and diplomatic onslaught for 34 days. Israel's much-vaunted military invincibility has taken a serious knock.

According to some international correspondents, even "the beneficiary of the destruction (of Lebanon's towns and villages) is most likely to be Hezbollah." Thousands of Hezbollah members across the country are busy cleaning, organizing and surveying the damages done by Israeli bombings. Hezbollah and its leaders have grown in stature and are now hailed all over the Muslim world as heroes, whose examples are to be emulated.

Even al-Maliki, the prime minister of Iraq's American sponsored government has condemned the Israeli actions as crimes against humanity. Fouad Siniora, the pro-Western prime minister of Lebanon has felt so let down by American acquiescence in Israel's indiscriminate killing of Lebanese civilians by using American warplanes and bombs that he has felt compelled to ask why the US treats the Arabs as "the children of lesser gods."

Israel has not come out of this confrontation unscathed. Never before has it suffered such a sustained, indiscriminate rocket attack on its homes and factories inside its own territory. Never before have so many Israeli citizens been displaced from their homes to bunkers because of rocket attacks from a neighbouring country.

Until now with the unconditional support of its patron, Israel has violated the airspace of its neighbours, made land incursions, fired American-supplied precision-guided bombs on civilian targets and committed numerous assassinations with impunity and without fear of reprisal. But now Hezbollah has dealt a serious blow to its morale.

Every state has a right to feel secure within its borders and that applies not only to Israel but also to its neighbours. Hopefully, this war may force Israel to redefine its strategic needs. If Israel wants to live in peace in the Middle East, it must stop acting as America's deputy sheriff in the region and negotiate a comprehensive peace deal with all its neighbours in line with the Beirut Declaration of 2002, which guaranteed its security. Israel cannot insist on the full implementation of UN resolution 1701 until it complies with prior UN resolutions which called for the return of all occupied territories and the creation of a viable Palestinian state along the pre-1967 borders. A comprehensive peace deal will force the guerrilla groups to disband or merge into the armed forces of their respective countries because the reason for their existence would disappear.

Israel must realise that in the long run, its much- vaunted strategic alliance with the United States will not be able to guarantee its safety and security. In an article published in El Pais of August 14, Professor Norman Birnbaum, an American Jewish intellectual of great reputation pointed out that all strategic alliances are temporary and that at a future date the US would not hesitate to abandon Israel if it feels necessary to do so for its own strategic interests.