Israel's war aims in south Lebanon are governed by a race against time, writes Tom Clonan
The Israeli military - like all international armies - can only deploy and manoeuvre at a certain pace. Caught off-guard by Hizbullah's lightning strike on an Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) border patrol - and the unleashing of a continuous barrage of missiles on to northern Israel - Israel's general staff has been hard-pressed in recent weeks to mount a coherent and successful military response.
The initial response by Israel's security cabinet and the IDF was to mount an intense - and seemingly senseless and indiscriminate - bombardment of the whole of Lebanon by air, land and sea. The aerial bombardment failed to stem support for Hizbullah among the Lebanese population and also failed to disrupt Hizbullah's resupply and infiltration routes to the north of Lebanon, the Bekaa Valley and Syria. This component of Israel's military strategy has caused a great deal of alarm and dismay among the international community. It has resulted in many hundreds of civilian deaths - particularly of children - and has brought Israel and the IDF into disrepute.
The deaths of innocent Lebanese women and children at Qana, along with the deaths by Israeli fire of unarmed UN observers at Khiam, have played directly into the hands of Hizbullah. Despite Israel's ongoing campaign of aerial and naval bombardment - with so-called precision bombing - Hizbullah rockets continue to strike targets deep within northern Israel on an uninterrupted basis. Under the twin stewardship of Hizbullah's military leadership and its "Media Chief" Hassan Rahal, the "Party of God" - despite its clearly indiscriminate and murderous campaign of missile attacks on Israel - is thus far firmly maintaining the initiative in the propaganda war.
The Israeli military, on the other hand, would appear to be floundering in terms of the PR and propaganda campaign - increasingly essential components of modern warfare. The Israeli government was humiliated earlier this week when prime minister Ehud Olmert's unequivocal statement to the effect that Hizbullah's infrastructure had been "completely destroyed" by the IDF was answered from Lebanon with a massive wave of 200 missile strikes. Israel's spectacular - but largely useless - commando raid in Baalbek also failed to bring the IDF a badly needed propaganda coup in recent days.
With the IDF desperately seeking to win public approval among a domestic and international audience for its clumsy - and thus far inconclusive - military campaign in Lebanon, it would appear by Day 23 of the hostilities to have finally evolved a simple, but highly problematic strategy for containing Hizbullah.
The air campaign conducted by the Israeli Air Force has clearly had little effect on Hizbullah's ability to operate along the border and to launch missile attacks. The general staff of the IDF has therefore had to evolve a strategy for its ground forces which is gradually taking shape by way of incursion into south Lebanon.
With 15,000 ground troops - approximately three divisions - now mobilised, equipped and deployed to the Lebanese border, the IDF strategy appears deceptively simple. Their objective is ideally to push Hizbullah north of the River Litani to a line approximately 25 km away from the Israeli border. Crucially, this would place the majority of Hizbullah's missiles - approximately 10,000 Katyusha rockets with a range of 25 km - out of range of Israeli territory. By creating such a buffer or "security zone", as the IDF is now referring to it, the Israelis would also prevent Hizbullah Zelzal-2 missiles from reaching Tel Aviv.
The Israeli capital - and many of Israel's nuclear assets - are located about 120 km south of the Lebanese border.
Hizbullah is believed by the IDF to possess up to 40 Iranian-manufactured Zelzal missiles with a range of 120 km and warheads consisting of 600 kg of high explosives.
A Zelzal missile fired by Hizbullah from Naquora, Bint Jubayl or any other Lebanese border village could easily reach Tel Aviv, thus fulfilling Sheikh Nasrallah's threat to "strike south of Haifa".
Such a propaganda "spectacular" for Hizbullah might provoke Israel towards wider retaliation, with the escalation and widening of the conflict throughout the region.
The IDF will therefore hope to occupy and "sterilise" a sizeable chunk of south Lebanon - creating a cordon sanitaire north of the Israeli border to the Litani river. This would place Hizbullah's most powerful missiles out of reach of the Israeli capital and confine their range to the less densely populated cities of northern Israel, including Haifa, Tiberias and Nazareth.
At present, the IDF is pushing into Lebanon on two main fronts. The right flank of Israel's offensive is being supported from the Kiryat Shmona area to the east and north of the border with Israel. This west and south facing thrust, consisting of elements from the elite IDF Golani and Nahal Brigades, is attempting to push through the villages of Kafr Kila, At Tyyabah and Addaisseh - along an axis of advance just south of Marjayoun, Khiam and the Litani river.
The left flank of Israel's ground incursion is moving north and east into Lebanese territory through Ayt a-Shab, Yarun, Maroun al Ras and Bint Jubayl. The IDF strategy will most likely be to conduct a "Hammer and Anvil" style operation where both thrusts will meet in the central area of south Lebanon - around at-Tiri, Tibnin, and Brashit, where Irish battalions in Unifil were located. This convergence of IDF formations will be designed to prevent Hizbullah from withdrawing from the area. Follow-up operations would be designed to move west towards the coastal city of Tyre with the Mediterranean and the Litani forming the western and northern limits of the IDF incursion.
Trapped between IDF units to the south, north and east and by the Mediterranean to the west - in theory - Hizbullah would be forced to stand and fight. In this way the IDF would hope to destroy their ground forces and missile infrastructure in detail.
Unfortunately for the IDF, resistance from Hizbullah ground positions has been much stiffer than expected, with fierce hand-to-hand combat in the contested villages of Ayt a Shab, Bint Jubayl and Marun al Ras.
Official IDF figures state that six Hizbullah fighters were killed in firefights in Ayt a Shab, with the loss of three IDF personnel. Eight IDF soldiers were killed in one ambush alone by Hizbullah fighters in Bint Jubayl. Based on such casualty figures and an "exchange ratio" of 2:1 - one IDF soldier killed for every two Hizbullah killed in action - the current IDF ground offensive may be slow and costly in terms of human life, both military and civilian.
Estimates on the strength of Hizbullah ground forces in Lebanon range between 3,000 and 12,000. The IDF plans to drive them north to the Litani or destroy them in situ may prove problematic.
Israel's defence minister Peretz has stated that the IDF offensive will be shaped and "adapted for the diplomatic window" afforded by the ongoing UN Security Council debate on terms for a ceasefire. Israel knows that it will take the international community some time to reach a consensus on a cessation of hostilities and an even longer time to assemble a multinational rapid reaction force to deploy to Lebanon.
In the interim, both Hizbullah and the IDF will be locked in a desperate struggle to inflict the maximum casualties and damage on the other side. The IDF hopes for a coherent military result may well be denied them in the coming weeks. And if Hizbullah succeeds in firing a long-range missile into Tel Aviv, the consequences might be apocalyptic.
• Dr Tom Clonan is a security analyst