Israel’s Proxy Force Holds the Line in South Lebanon

MARJAYOUN, Lebanon —  As recently as last spring, a long list of critics--including some in the Israeli army’s central command--predicted disaster for Israel’s military strategy in southern Lebanon. Experience has so far shown otherwise.

With the regular army ordered back inside Israel, that strategy relied on an Israeli-backed Lebanese proxy force to control a so-called security zone extending several miles north of the border and running its entire length.

The zone is a buffer to protect Israel’s northern settlements against the kind of terrorist attacks that provoked Israel’s invasion of Lebanon in June, 1982.

Skeptics warned that the largely Christian proxy force, called the South Lebanon Army, would never be able to stand up against an expected onslaught of Lebanese Muslims determined to drive it out of the buffer zone.

The skeptics argued that Israel would have to send its own troops back across the border or the proxy force would disintegrate, leaving Israel’s northern settlements vulnerable to infiltration and rocket assaults.

Now, however, three months after the bulk of the Israeli army pulled out, the force has surprised everyone by how well it has held its own.

“The pessimists said (the SLA would last) two weeks; the optimists said a month,” a high-ranking Israeli army officer in the north commented. “Well, (the SLA) works. And it’s working better every day.”

While this may please many Israelis, it also means that Jerusalem is likely to continue to resist calls by Lebanon and some other nations that the security zone be erased and replaced by a force of U.N. peacekeeping troops.

The mandate under which U.N. troops are already deployed farther to the north in Lebanon expires next month, and David Kimche, director general of Israel’s Foreign Ministry, conceded in an interview, “We won’t be sorry if it has its demise.”

Kimche added: “As soon as we can have security without the security zone, we will disband it. But that may take many, many years.”

By declaring several hundred square miles of Lebanon to be inside its security zone, Israel has virtually annexed the territory militarily. Israeli patrols range freely back and forth across the frontier, which has only Israeli border guards.

Paid, Trained by Israel

The South Lebanon Army, headquartered in an old British fort here, is paid, trained, equipped, and ultimately directed by Israel. Scores of Israeli officers and troops continually milling about a large courtyard of the headquarters complex are part of a liaison unit comprising several hundred advisers assigned to the proxy force.

In addition, Israeli soldiers man an unspecified number of permanent observation posts in the security zone.

“We are definitely in need of the backing of Israel,” said the South Lebanon Army’s commander, Brig. Gen. Antoine Lahad, a retired officer of the regular Lebanese army.

His troops have come under daily attack ever since the bulk of the Israeli army withdrew from Lebanon early last June. About a dozen militiamen have been killed, most of them victims of eight suicide car-bomb attacks against checkpoints at the northern edge of the security zone.

‘Surprising’ Ability

However, Zev Schiff, Israeli author of a widely acclaimed book on the war in Lebanon and an early critic of the security-zone concept, said the militia is not crumbling, as some thought it would.

“The way they are absorbing casualties and their ability to inflict casualties on the other side are surprising,” he said.

Up to 60 militia members have deserted during the last three months, according to Lahad and his Israeli advisers. But “the defections are much less than we were expecting from the start,” Lahad said in an interview here.

Another 50 to 60 men have asked to leave the militia and been given permission to do so, he added.

Strength up to 2,000

Meanwhile, a recruiting effort has boosted the size of the militia army from fewer than 1,500 in June to about 2,000 now, according to a senior Israeli army officer.

A handful of Katyusha rockets have landed in northern Israel since June but have caused no damage. And Lahad and his Israeli advisers all say that the rockets were apparently fired from north of the security zone, in areas not under the Christian militia’s control.

The only reported infiltration through the security zone occurred last week, when three terrorists from the Libyan-backed Palestinian Arab Revolutionary Committee got as far as the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights before being captured by Israeli troops.

Outsiders Blamed

Most attacks on the proxy force come not from residents of the security zone but from outsiders, the senior Israeli officer said.

According to Lahad, “The most serious operations have been carried out by organizations which are directly controlled by Syria.”

One weakness of the South Lebanon Army stems, ironically, from what may also be the most important secret of its unexpected success.

Under an Israeli-inspired reorganization last spring, the force was divided into sectarian battalions and assigned, to a much greater extent than before, to duty around their home villages.

Thus, Druze militiamen man roadblocks in the eastern sector of the zone, dominated by Druze villages, while Christians serve almost exclusively in the Christian area around Marjayoun and in the western sector, site of a mixture of Christian and Shia Muslim villages.

Shia Muslim Pressure

Motivation among the militiamen improved when they knew they were defending their own homes, an Israeli liaison officer said.

The problem is a Shia Muslim battalion, which is subject to great pressure from the majority of Shias in south Lebanon, who are sworn to drive Israel and its proxies from the region. Nearly all the desertions have been from this battalion, and the region of Shia villages southwest of here is an area of significant resistance to the proxy force from inside the security zone.

While not as well equipped as the Israeli army, the proxy force has heavy artillery. “They could shell Tyre, they could shell Sidon and with a little effort they could shell Beirut, also,” the senior Israeli army officer said. He added, however, that he sets the policy on targets.

That policy has also been controversial. Earlier this summer, for example, the force shelled two Shia villages in the security zone in retaliation for attacks against its positions. The Israeli officer said he approved the shelling because the hostile fire came from the villages.

A major problem has been clashes between the proxy forces and U.N. peacekeeping troops deployed immediately north of the security zone. Israel radio reported Sunday that, according to a new U.N. protest, the militia has fired several times in the last few days at soldiers from the Irish, Dutch and Finnish peacekeeping detachments.

Kidnaping Incident

The most serious such incident occurred last June when Lahad’s men kidnaped a group of Finnish U.N. troops in retaliation for what he claimed was U.N. complicity in the alleged desertion of several of his troops to Amal, the major Shia Muslim militia in Lebanon.

Israel doesn’t want unnecessary problems with nations that furnish troops to the U.N. force, and, according to the senior Israeli army officer, it has acted to restrain the South Lebanon Army.

However, Jerusalem would rather have the Israeli-controlled force deployed on its northern border than U.N. troops over which it has no direct influence.