Army probe: Israel bungled Lebanon war

An internal military investigation has concluded that Israel's 2006 war against Hezbollah guerrillas in Lebanon failed because top commanders didn't communicate properly and were slow to prepare a ground offensive, the retired general who conducted the probe said Saturday.

The reserve general, Udi Shani, also said that the army chief at the time, Lt. Gen. Dan Halutz, wasn't receptive enough to dissenting views among top commanders and should have spent more time near the front lines, rather than at military headquarters.

"The military failed," Shani told Israel Radio. "It didn't operate properly."

Shani conducted an internal army investigation of the performance of the top command at the same time as a five-member investigative panel headed by retired Judge Eliyahu Winograd examined the performance of the government and the army. The Winograd Commission said in its final report Wednesday that Israel did not win the 34-day war and the army did not provide an effective response to a deadly Hezbollah barrage of nearly 4,000 rockets on northern Israel. Israel conducted a heavy aerial campaign but reservists returning from the battlefield complained of poor training and a lack of ammunition and key supplies.

According to official figures from both sides, between 1,035 and 1,191 Lebanese civilians and combatants died in the conflict, in addition to 119 Israeli soldiers and 40 civilians.

Shani said the reliance on air attacks was reasonable in the first few days of the war, but that commanders then should have prepared for a ground offensive.

Instead, the military embarked on the ground offensive at the last minute, just as a U.N. truce was about to take effect. More than 30 Israeli soldiers were killed in that fighting.

"The military failed because it had an erroneous concept," Shani said in an apparent reference to the heavy reliance on air strikes.

Winograd said the 11th-hour offensive failed in its mission, did not improve Israel's position and that the army was not prepared for it. However, he said the operation's goals were legitimate.

Most of the army's wartime commanders, including Halutz, resigned after the war.