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During the 2006 Lebanon War, Operation Sharp and Smooth (Template:Lang-he), also known as the Baalbek operation, was an Israel Defense Forces (IDF) raid on hospital in Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley which was also a Hezbollah headquarter. According to HRW and Lebanon security 16 Lebanese most of them civilians were killed.According to IDF 10 Hezbollah "terrorist" were killed during the operations. .Five Lebanese civilians were abducted to Israel but released after three weeks.

The operation

The operation began with at least five rapid air strikes. Approximately 200 elite commandos fast-roped from helicopters which previously refuelled over the Mediterranean Sea. The operation involved two commando units: Shaldag of the Israeli Air Force, and Sayeret Matkal of the IDF Branch of Intelligence (Aman).

According to the IDF ten "terrorists" were killed and five captured during a "precise surgical raid", that claimed no IDF or civilian casualties. The IDF claimed at first that some of the captives "were known Hizbullah gunmen."but later there were identified as civilians and were released by IDF after 3 weeks..According to Human Rights Watch and Lebanese authorities most of the fatalities were civilians.

Upon landing, the two units split up. The Sayeret Matkal unit proceeded to the Dar al-Hikma hospital, known for its connections to Hezbollah, in the Jamaliyah suburb of Ba'albek.

The Israeli force occupied the hospital. According to HRW one male nurse was killed and two security guards were wounded during the take-over. Two armed Hezbollah fighters were killed outside the hospital while engaging the Israelis.

A group of local residents were alarmed by the sound of fighting and assembled at the house of the local mukhtar. Two of the men were armed members of the Lebanese Communist Party. An Israeli helicopter fired a number of missiles at the group, killing the two militants and five unarmed men. According to an assessment by Human Rights Watch the two armed militants were to be considered combatants and therefore legitimate targets.

A Syrian Kurdish family, working as agricultural workers, were hit by a missile, killing the parents and four children, aged 4 to 14. Surviving relatives denied any relationship with Hezbollah.

According to the investigation by Human Rights Watch 16 Lebanese were killed in the raid, of whom four were deemed combatants and a further two civilian members of Hezbollah or the Communist party. An official report by the Lebanese Interior Security Forces (ISF) confirm these numbers, although the names do not always match those supplied by HRW. Two of the victims were identified as belonging to Hezbollah but the Communist party members were not mentioned in the report. The report also contained the names of the 14 Lebanese wounded in the fighting.

The second Israeli unit swept through the al-Usaira neighborhood of Ba'albek, some five kilometers from the hospital. Apparently they were looking for persons related to Hassan Nasrallah, the General-Secretary of Hezbollah. The Israeli soldiers entered a house in the neighborhood and asked a shopkeeper if he was Hassan Nasrallah, which was his name, although he was unrelated to the Hezbollah leader. Nasrallah, his 14 year old son and five other civilians were kidnapped. The prisoners were allegedly beaten and threatened by IDF soldiers. The soldiers threatened to kill 14 year old Muhammad Nasrallah together with his father unless he told them who was in the resistance. The boy was released but the five adults were brought to Israel.

The prisoners, two of whom were elderly, were imprisoned for four days and nights inside a bus. Israeli reserve soldiers serving in the Military Police complained about the procedure, calling it "hard to describe it as humanitarian treatment." The reluctance of the IDF to open a formal Prisoner of War facility contravened army regulations. Around 20 Lebanese prisoners were held at the facility, most of whom were released after questioning.

The prisoners were subjected to repeated interrogations about their relationship to Hezbollah and its leader. On August 16, they were finally allowed to see a lawyer who brought a petition to the Israeli Supreme Court to obtain their release. Instead of answering the petition the IDF released the five to UNIFIL, three weeks after being abducted. "We captured five people we thought were involved with Hezbollah," explained an Israeli official to New York Times. "Under questioning it turned out we were wrong. So we turned them over to the U.N."

The precise target of the operation remains a mystery. The Jerusalem Post suggests that the IDF believed that the two captured soldiers, Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev, were being treated there after their abduction and that raid’s purpose was to collect intelligence about their fate. Lebanese sources claimed that the target of the raid was Muhammad Yazbek, a well-known Hezbollah leader living in the area who had been accused by Israel of involvement in the capture of IDF Colonel (res.) Elhanan Tannenbaum in 2000. Yazbek however escaped unhurt. A spokesman for the IDF denied that the operation had a "specific target". Chief of Staff Lt.-Gen. Dan Halutz claimed that "the main goal" was to deliver a message to Hizbullah that the IDF "can operate deep inside Lebanon and wherever else we want to." According to Ami Pedahzur the raid was an unsuccessful attempt to kidnap Hezbollah activists for "bargaining" purposes.

Hezbollah leader Nasrallah mockingly commented the raid in Baalbek: "There were two landings near Baalbek and not in the heart of Baalbek. They stormed a hospital and threw a grenade. Pay attention to the great gain, to search for injured fighters who they didn’t capture during the battle. They weren't there, they kidnapped five civilians and they are hostages. This is intelligence, this is the Mossad?"

According to an account published in Maariv a month after the war the IDF had learnt beforehand that the intended target of the operation would not be in place. The IDF however decided to go ahead with it for "propaganda purposes". The aim had been to obtain information about the fate of the abducted soldiers but in fact none was obtained. In spite of this it was marketed as a success story. The report was denied by the IDF.

Former chief of staff Moshe Ya'alon, a sharp critic of IDF conduct during the Lebanon war, questioned whether the raid was "justified in terms of risk, cost and benefit" and whether it was not simply "an adventure."

Fatalities

Group of men killed by hellfire missiles fired from helicopter or drone:

• Maxim "'Ali" Jamal al-Din, 18 (combatant in Communist Party)
• 'Awad Jamal al-Din, 58 (combatant in Communist Party)
• Hassan Jamal al-Din, 18
• Naji Jamal al-Din, 45
• Muhammad Naji Jamal al-Din, 12
• Malik Jamal al-Din, 22
• Hussain Yusif al-Mekdad, 42

Men killed in or around Dar al-Hikma hospital:

• Atif Amhaz (nurse, civilian Hezbollah member)
• Rida Midlej (Hezbollah combatant)
• Wissam Ahmad Yaghi (Hezbollah combatant)

Syrian Kurdish family killed by Hellfire missile strike:

• Talal Chibli, 40
• Maha al-'Issa Sha'ban, 35
• Muhanad Talal Chibli, 14
• Muayyad Talal Chibli, 12
• Asma Talal Chibli, 6
• Muhammad Talal Chibli, 4

Civilians kidnapped to Israel

• Hasan Deeb Nasrallah, 60
• Bilal Nasrallah, 32
• Ahmad Salih al-‘Awtah (or al-Ghawtah), 55
• Hasan al-Burji, 40
• Muhammad Shukr, unknown age

External Links

Video of the operation by IAF,

Sources

• Human Rights Watch (HRW), "Why They Died", Civilian Casualties in Lebanon during the 2006 War, September 2007

References

1. HRW, pp.124-129
2. "כך התנהל מבצע הקומנדו בבעלבק". Retrieved February 19, 2012.
3. ^ "The Israeli secret services and the struggle against terrorism". p. 132. Retrieved February 19, 2012. Cite error: The named reference "peda" was defined multiple times with different content (see the help page).
4. "כך התנהל מבצע הקומנדו בבעלבק". Retrieved February 19, 2012.
5. ^ "Raid 'sends message' to Hizbullah". Jerusalem Post. 2006-08-02.
6. "Special Forces Raid in Baal-bek". ISRAEL DEFENSE FORCES. 03/08/2006. Retrieved Dec 4 2011. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= and |date= (help)
7. ^ HRW, pp. 192-193
8. ^ "تقرير أمني يقدّم المعلومات الرسمية عن إنزال بعلبك (A security report presents official information on the Ba'lbak landing)". al-Mustaqbal. Aug 3 2006. Retrieved Dec 28 2011. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= and |date= (help)
9. HRW, pp. 125-126
10. HRW, pp. 126-127
11. HRW, pp. 127-128
12. Nir Hasson (22.08.2006). "Reservists: Lebanese POWs were kept in bus for 4 days". Haaretz. Retrieved Feb 25, 2012. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
13. KIFNER, John (August 23, 2006). "What's in a Name? Not, It Seems, a Leader of Hezbollah in Lebanon". The New York Times. Retrieved 2006-08-23.
14. HRW, pp. 128-130
15. Roee Nahmias (08.03.06). "Nasrallah: We'll bomb Tel Aviv if Beirut attacked". Yedioth Ahronoth. Retrieved Feb 9, 2012. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
16. Amir Rappaport (15/09/2006). "הפעולה בבעל בק - לצרכי תעמולה (The operation in Baalbek – for propaganda purposes)". Ma'ariv. Retrieved Jan 23 2012. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= and |date= (help)
17. Ari Shavit (14.09.2006). "No way to go to war". Haaretz. Retrieved Jun 4 2010. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= and |date= (help)
18. ^ "Israel raid 'captures Hezbollah fighters'". al-Jazeera. 02 Aug 2006. Retrieved Feb 9, 2012. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)

• 2006 Lebanon War