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At one time, when we were talking and having a conversation with this Hezbollah representative, he said, “Look, we’re serious, we will kill you if you film these outgoing rockets.” So it is a threat, but when we’ve been out in the field, we’ve not had situations where they told us to stop filming.
What's interesting, what's different about this rocket that hit here in Kfar Giladi, which is very close to the Lebanese border, is that one of the rockets hit a large concentration of people that had gathered in this car park, right behind me, and exploded and killed 10 of them, according to the Israeli defense forces.
Originally posted by intrepid
He needed IDF to confirm what his eyes could very well tell him? This story, and that's what I think this is, was written, and not very well.
And joining us now here Washington Anne Compton who covers the White House for ABC News, and Thomas Ricks, Pentagon reporter for "The Washington Post" and author of the new book "Fiasco: The American Military Adventure in Iraq."
Tom Ricks, you've covered a number of military conflicts, including Iraq, as I just mentioned. Is civilian casualties increasingly going to be a major media issue? In conflicts where you don't have two standing armies shooting at each other? THOMAS RICKS, REPORTER, "THE WASHINGTON POST": I think it will be. But I think civilian casualties are also part of the battlefield play for both sides here. One of the things that is going on, according to some U.S. military analysts, is that Israel purposely has left pockets of Hezbollah rockets in Lebanon, because as long as they're being rocketed, they can continue to have a sort of moral equivalency in their operations in Lebanon.
KURTZ: Hold on, you're suggesting that Israel has deliberately allowed Hezbollah to retain some of it's fire power, essentially for PR purposes, because having Israeli civilians killed helps them in the public relations war here?
RICKS: Yes, that's what military analysts have told me.
KURTZ: That's an extraordinary testament to the notion that having people on your own side killed actually works to your benefit in that nobody wants to see your own citizens killed but it works to your benefit in terms of the battle of perceptions here.
RICKS: Exactly. It helps you with the moral high ground problem, because you know your operations in Lebanon are going to be killing civilians as well.
Originally posted by Mirthful Me
...KURTZ: Hold on, you're suggesting that Israel has deliberately allowed Hezbollah to retain some of it's fire power, essentially for PR purposes, because having Israeli civilians killed helps them in the public relations war here?...
Originally posted by timski
then launching a full 10-rocket volley toward Israel, but the aerial camera continues to train on the launch site, and a counter-strike by the IAF comes as the Hez. fighters are running away from the scene several minutes later...I thought it strange at the time, but in the light of this interview, it makes perfect sense to allow 'the enemy' to continue fighting in order to justify the prolonged Lebanon offensive