Prime Minister Ehud Barak is reputedly one of the smartest people in Israel, and is certainly experienced and knowledgeable about Lebanon. He has himself served in Lebanon, and was later IDF chief of staff. This week the smartest man in Israel gave the Hizbollah a big boost.

The Hizbollah, the Lebanese Islamic liberation movement, are no doubt an evil group. They write Israel as "Israel" and they insist that Tel-Aviv is in occupied Palestine. They are financed by Iran, and no doubt want to destroy Israel. Their biggest potential ally is Lebanese public opinion, which can approve of them as "liberators of the Zionist occupied territory." Their second biggest ally this week was the Israeli government, which gave the Hizbollah precisely what they wanted. The Hizbollah knew exactly what buttons to press. They killed a high SLA officer, and then they killed and wounded several Israeli soldiers. Finally, the reaction came - strikes at Lebanese civilian targets to make the Lebanese man in the street loath Israel even more.

Perhaps Barak had to do it, because he has to take into account opponents more immediate than either the Hizbollah or Hafez Assad of Syria. Opposition politicians, especially Limor Livnat of the Likud, were insisting that Israel could not leave the deaths of its soldiers unavenged, and could not carry on negotiations with Syria while the Hizbollah continued to kill Israeli soldiers. So the Israeli cabinet had to do "something," especially as talks with Syria are likely to resume. The talks must resume because they are Israel’s best chance of getting out of Lebanon with an agreement in hand that will safeguard the towns along northern border.

The result was these barbarous attacks on power stations in Lebanon. The Israeli government has tried to convince us that these attacks caused restraint in the Hizbollah. Somehow, this is hard to believe. Hizbollah leaders do not seem to be overly concerned about Lebanese civilians, except when they can be paraded as victims of Israel violence. In fact, they make a point of protecting their “freedom fighters” by firing from inside of populated areas - using the civilians as hostages. That, after all, is what made the Israeli government angry ostensibly: firing from inside towns in violation of the “Grapes of Wrath” agreements.

PM Barak and his government are  also trying to sell us the idea that these attacks will make the Lebanese government restrain the Hizbollah, but the fact is that the Lebanese government cannot do anything without the consent of the Syrians. They also claimed that the Syrians are returning to the negotiating table because Israel bombed Jamhour, but I somehow doubt that Hafez Assad is motivated by grave humanitarian concern for the plight of Lebanese civilians.