From: Hank Roth <odin@halcyon.halcyon.com>
Subject: Israel's Aggression in Lebanon
Followup-To: alt.activism.d
Originator: rich@pencil.cs.missouri.edu
Organization: The 23:00 News and Mail Service
Date: Thu, 24 Dec 1992 07:17:25 GMT

<<< via P_news/p.news >>>
{From ISRAEL'S WAR IN LEBANON: 
Eyewitness Chronicles of the Invasion and Occupation. Compiled by 
Franklin P. Lamb, 1984, Bertand Russell Peace Foundation/also 
available from South End Press.} 
 
"Events, no matter how ghastly, quickly lose reality when reduced 
to the flat, journalistic, prose of day-to-day reporting. This 
excellent book should help arrest that process since it vividly 
records the reckless brutality of that event through 
unchallengeable eyewitness accounts. Without such a work as this, 
the whole gruesome episode could well be lost in unread footnotes 
as the perpetrators invent---and wishful thinkers shamelessly 
expound---an exculpatory mythology." (Honorable George W. Ball, 
Former Undersecretary of State) 
 
INTRODUCTION---PART 3
 
THE REQUIREMENT OF PROPORTIONALITY
 
The international law requirement of proportionality in the use 
of force applies even to a legitimate exercise of the right to 
self-defense under Article 51 of the UN Charter. Perhaps more 
compelling today than Webster's "instant and overwhelming" 
standard for the use of self-defense, noted [below], is his 
articulation of the requirement of proportionality. To the 
British Government, Webster wrote: 
 
  "It will be for Her Majesty's government to show also that the 
   local authorities of Canada, even supposing the necessity of the 
   moment authorized them to enter the territories of the United 
   States at all [referring to the CAROLINE affair in a previous 
   post], DID NOTHING UNREASONABLE OR EXCESSIVE; [my emphasis] since
   the act justified by the necessity of self-defense must be 
   limited by that necessity and kept clearly within it."
 
Proportionality means that force used in response to actual or 
anticipated armed attack must be proportional, in both kind and 
amount, to the precipitating atack. The principle of 
proportionality requires that the response to a threat be limited 
in intensity and magnitude to what is reasonably necessary 
promptly to secure the permissible objectives of self-defense. In 
different words, this requirement entails a limitation of means 
and a limitation in time for the exercise of the right of self-
defense. The means employed in defensive intervention must be 
strictly confined to the removal of the danger and must be 
reasonably proportioned to that objective.
 
The United States supports this rule of international law. James 
B. Michel, deputy legal advisor at the Staqte Department, 
testified recently on this issue before the house Committee on 
Foreign Affairs. On July 15, 1982, following the Israeli 
invasion, he advised the committee that the United States' view 
is:
 
  "You [a country, or member of the international community] can 
   only use such force as is proportional to meet the danger, to 
   meet the threat, and to respond it it; that is, there is not a 
   license to go on and obliterate a state that has committed wrong 
   against you."
 
This statement is consistent with well accepted international law.
 
According to the Secretary General, Israel invaded Lebanon with a 
force of "more than two mechanized divisions with full air and 
naval support." The widely reported devastation, dislocation, and 
suffering visited by Israel on the civilian Lebanese and 
Palestinian population resulted in more than 50,000 dead or 
wounded and 600,000 made homeless, as well as more than $10 
billion in property damage. This carnage is egregiously 
disporportionate to any alleged harm or threat of harm to 
Israel's legitimate national security interests posed by the 
presence of the PLO in Lebanon.
 
Indeed, during the UN Security Council debate on the Israeli 
invasion, no delegate supported the argument that Israeli actions 
met the proportionality requirement. Discussing proportionality, 
the chairman of the Israeli Knesset's Foreign Affairs and Defense 
Committee stated to the NEW YORK TIMES that the Israeli action in 
Lebananon was not intended to be proportional. 
 
Finally any unilateral claim, in this case by Israel, to self-
defense must be determined to be reasonable in all its 
circumstances for it to be honored by community tolerance and 
acquiesence. The State's determination that self-defense is 
necessary, as well as the proportionality of the actions it 
takes, is subject to review by the international community. 
Review of Israel's invasion by the international community has 
rejected Israel's claims that it was acting in self-defense.
 
`AGGRESSION' IN INTERNATIONAL LAW
 
International customary law as to what constitutes "aggression" 
was codified in the December 14, 1974 UN-sponsored draft 
definition of aggression which the United States has strongly 
supported. In this resolution, the UN General Assemby defined 
aggression as:
 
1. the invasion or attack by the armed forces of a state on the 
territory of another state, or any military occupation, however 
temporary, resulting from such invasion or attack, or any 
annexation by the use of force of the territory of another state 
or part thereof
 
2. bombardment by the armed forces of a state against the 
territory of another state or the use of any weapons by a state 
against the territory of another state
 
3. the blockade of the parts or coasts of a state by the armed 
forces of another state.
 
Two other General Assembly resolutions are relevant to this issue: 
the Declaration on the Inadmissability of Intervention (1965), 
and the Declaration on Principles of International Law Concerning 
Friendly Relations and Cooperation Among States in Accordance 
with the Charter of the United Nations (1970). Examined together, 
these resolutions establish that virtually the whole of the 
international community has adopted as law the standard that any 
nonconsensual military intervention by one state into the 
territory or affairs of another state is outlawed. Consequently, 
the Israeli invasion of Lebanon constitutes an "act of aggression" 
within the meaning and purpose of these resolutions.
 
Moreover, Article 2 of the Definition of Aggression provides that 
the "first use of armed force by a State in contravention of the 
Charter shall constitute prima facie evidence of an act of 
aggression." By its actions, including its rejection of Security 
Council Resolution 508, which the PLO accepted, as well as its 
massive invasion of Lebanon was further confirmed by Security 
Council and General Assembly Resolutions, including Security 
Council Resolution 509 of June 6, 1982, in which the Council 
demanded the immediate and unconditional withdrawal of all 
Israeli troops from Lebanon. The resolution stated:
 
  "Reaffirming the need for strict respect for the territorital 
   integrity, sovereignity and political independence of Lebanan 
   within its internationally recognized boundaries, [the Security 
   Council] demands that Israel withdraw all its military forces 
   forthwith and unconditionally from the internationally recognized 
   boundaries of Lebanon..."
 
On August 4, 1982, the Security Council, by a vote of 14-0, 
reaffirmed this resolution and, in Resolution 517, censured 
Israel for the invasion.
 
"[We are] deeply shocked and alarmed by the deplorable 
consequences of the Israeli invasion of Beirut on 3 August 1982; 
[The Security Council] confirms once again its demand for an 
immediate cease-fire and withdrawal of Israeli forces from Lebanon 
[and] censures Israel for its failure to comply with the above 
Resolutions." 
 
<End of Part 3>
 
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