Nasrallah Admits Mistake?

From ABC's The World Today (Australian Broadcasting Company):

"I want to be clear in my response, and I hope that people are listening to me now. We did not think even one per cent that the capture of the two Israelis would lead to a war at this time and of this magnitude, and if someone asked me why we didn't consider this one per cent, I would say that since 1982 and our relationships with the Israelis and the experience of our resistance with Israel, the operation wouldn't lead to such a result." - Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah

It's hard to take a terrorist leader for his word. Twisted propaganda and outright lies are usually the order of the day, after such events as we just witnessed in Lebanon. Excuses and denials are often offered up, as well. This is precisely why I am not altogether sure why Nasrallah has made such a frank statement as this.

But whatever the reasonings are, here we have a statement that comes close to an admission of guilt, in being the catalyst that lit up the Lebanon skies for several weeks. By nearly all journalistic interpretations, this is as close to being touted as a mistake, as you can get without using the word.

So, why then did Nasrallah and his band of thugs become so emboldened? It could be the usual.

I am sure Iran and Syria instigated the entire situation, for starters. Seeing Iran thumb its nose at the UN and get away with it, helped. It also could be that they thought Israel would swat at them, like they were doing in Gaza, immediately after the Cpl. Shalit incident. The western world has done much of that since 1979 and it has been duly noticed by Hezbollah, Hamas, al-Qaida, and the others that promote Islamic jihad.

But for now, we see that disproportionate force does seem to have some effect on the reflections of a terrorist leader. His miscalculations were:

1. The overall Israeli response.

2. Thinking that Iran and Syria would back them up, militarily.

The end result is a no decision, with the brunt of the damage suffered by Hezbollah and the Lebanese people, who are guilty by association and tolerance of such a radical group inside their borders. Mistake, miscalculation, regret, or whatever you wish to label it; it says that Hezbollah was the responsible party in all of this. It also casts a deep dark shadow on the states that support this kind of terror.

How to prevent this in the future is easy, just don't do it again. Or the next time, there will be no mercy and after-the-fact reflections will not be necessary.