The soldiers sent into the fortified villages, with instructions to be careful for civilians, were sent into death traps with the foreknowledge that there would be high casualities. Why are the lives of the enemy more precious that that of our own soliders?

The glory of the IDF, a little too late for these heroic stories, we surrended and lost....just look at the poll on this israeli website, only 8 % of the 7000 odd people who have voted (mostly israelis I assume) think we triumphed, while 63% think we were defeated....what more do the deluded and those in denial want to hear, I know heroic IDF stories. Linda Rivera

strange talking about winning , did IDF won the war?

Finally a sucess story about the IDF that appears in the media. Where is the Israeli public relations machine when we need it? It's too bad we don't have anyone in Israel that speaks another language besides Hebrew.

like american films about vietnam

What a great story. I'm convinced. The IDF is still the worlds most invincible fighting force. Its a pity that Colonel Itai Virov and his bunch of superboys could not help their buddies being cooked in their Merkava tanks outside Marjayoun. Lets make a movie about this. I'm sure Warner Bros will oblige and you can get Bruce Willis to play Virov. Why not even ask Mel Gibson.

the civilians and then flattened everything by air. Brave IDF soldiers should not have died to avoid killing terrorist supporters assumed to be "civilians." This was a war, not water polo.

Do u real believe after what we saw on International & Israeli news channels that this Col. Etai Virov is telling the truth. Wake up Israel ur IDF are nothing but Chickens

Look at the construction of this article, the quotations, the bombastic language used, the lack of detail: can it be more clear that this is a propaganda piece? a communique by the IDF couldn't be more brochure-like...

in 1973 israel were 103 km from cairo, yet nasser of egypt claimed victtory, when asked how he could claim victory when israeli soilders were within 103 km of his capital, his reply was, because israeli's themselves are saying that they lost,i think what israeli's say has little to do with anything we have different standards of winning and losing.and linda dont go saying "we" i am positive you do not belong in the "we "camp so just be hoest next time, your opinion will still matter. I thing that as soon as one jew died we lost this war, simple as,Its funny that Hezbollah "won" even though they lost atleast 500 fighters, obviously the fact they lost 5 times as many fighters, lost ground up to the latani river, hid in bunkers for a month while israeli leaders walked in the open and that hezbollah did not conquer i metre of israeli terrortory and hid amongs women and children resulting in hundreds of their fellow civiliand deaths is considered a victory, is beyond me, but then agian i never did understand their mentality or people like yours either.

Iran or Hizbullah should name one Hizbullah fortification or stronghold that didn't fall when attacked by Israeli soldiers ... if Hizbullah can call a score of 0 out of 50 a 'victory' against Israel (O being the number of Hizbollah fortifications sustaining victory over an Israeli assault) then no wonder Islam can find so many 'dumb-bombs' willing to commit suicide while trying to kill unsuspecting and unarmed women and children ... The only thing Hizbullah had in its favor during this war was Olmert - Peretz - and Livni. Great job Israeli soldiers!! www.alphanewsdaily.com www.theprophecies.com

There is no peace against the terrorists who wanna cancel your rights. Stay ready, debrief the Army and analyze the previous troubles. There will be time for a great victory, there will be time for so much pages of IDF glory, and finally, when all the modern world will be with Israel, there will be time for peace after the defeat of Syria, Iran and the other terrorists. It's only a question of time. Israel must be strong, with the Army and Olmert and not against who wanna strongly defend your (and our) rights. The IDF Army is the winner on the field as the forces fighting in every part of the world against the terrorist. There is no reason to criticize Israel and everyone honest with himself must say "thank you". Defending yourself, attacking the common enemy, you are defending everyone from their invasion and terror. Never another September 11, but if they will hit again i hope all the world will really fight as you do, and win, as you do. yours sincerely A free Christian from Rome, Italy.

I heard more stories like these from soldiers who returned. Hezbollah terrorists were crying for help. I guess nobody ever will know how many of them were killed, as Hezbollah only shouting victory, no matter how big the losses, but IDF has lists of hundreds of names. Lebanese journalists said inside the precision bombed Beirut (head)quarters were also hundreds of Hezbollah fighters killed and the bunkers are filled with the stench of these terrorists. Not innocent civilians. Not for nothing uniformed Hezbollah are patrolling those areas and keeping people away. All of you here crying foul as if you were there, without you really know what happened. You know nothing.

Yes, like all those towns in southern lebanon which the Israelis "conquered and controlled" but just could not seem seem to stay alive inside of them. Great Victory!

Marc We could always include how the only useful thing the Australlans have done for twentieth and twentyfirst century world affairs is.....Neighours and the Flying Doctors and Crocdile Dundee. TAMIR - ISRAEL

Marc, I hear that the Australian army is strong, about as strong as the Italian army. We run from everything too. by the way, it was deffinately not a penalty hahaha Alexandro, Milano

Lu , Byblos - Lebanon Lets see how Ballsy your Lebanese Fighters will be when they come face to face with the Hizbullah. Probably will end up playing cards with them. Its a true fact that out of all arab armys, Lebanese army is the army which would most likely surrender first. And you can bet any money you want, that each and every member of your 15000 strong hard lebanese soldiers travelling towards the south now are praying the Hisbollah dont make the Israelis return, Your soldiers will run faster than the Egyptians in 1967. Franky - UK

Win or lose, dont matter about that, Hizbollah are in ruins They have no where to go no homes to go home to Many many were killed and hundred injured. So you can say we won or they won, but the Hizbollah has been practically...put to sleep

Yes, Fancy a job?

Ricardo Yes it was a hard fight. A very hard one, we lose a lot of soldiers very difficult to fight a war like this. If it was syria, a matter of days and its finished for real. The Hisbollah taking children and placing them in buidlings where they fire rockets. This is the mentality of the arab. They will kill their own for their own benefit. And we fight against this type of people. So very difficult. Conventional war, its different. Syria. We fly past the home of Assad in Syria and made his windows shake, just a little message to him. Do you honestly beleive a syrian plane could get into Israeli airspace? Do you think that Boaz - Petach Tickvah - Israel

different. hizballah lost 550- 600 killed while we lost fewer the 140 killed.

Marc Unlike arab menatlity israel try to spare as many civilians as possible. We sorry we killed but we could finish this war in 12 hours if we really really want, you dont think we could not just take the whole of s lebanion from the sky and carpet bomb? Marc, you are from australia, what the hell do u know about wars, stick to what you guys know best, swimming and daytime tv soaps Haim, Netanya Israel

Hey I am Hizbullah fighter. You Israelis are dumb for caring about Lebanese civilians. We dont. We always fired our rockets from civilian areas like schools and nurseries. Yes we knew that the enemy would attack and kill he children in the schools, but we wanted that. Our rescuers got some great pictures. Anyway, I have to go now back to the south. Allah hu akbar.

Alexandro what are u saying ? Respect your country and the story of our Italian Army. The Italian Army, also during the defeat of the second war world without equipments and food has written tons of pages of glory. In the modern time , we assured difficult missions such as the previous lebanon peacekeeping mission and Afghanistan/Iraq war against terror, being appreciated by all for human and fighting capability. I hope Italy troops will help Israel to mantain the supremacy against the terror and the UN and Lebanon troops will avoid to help hitzbolla and all the terrorists too much...... Take higher our flag (not only for football reasons) as the Israely friends are doing, togheter with them. Vincent.

Thank you haim, I cud not have put it more succint myself. We were sitting in shelters and Marc who is probably into his 10th beer by now tells us how we should fight our wars. I am proud to be an Australian - the best country in the world..but when it comes to choosing which army I wud prefer to have my back u can bet ur RED ROOSTER that IDF would be number 1 choice!!!

Vincent You are right I love Italy of course but, didnt our forefathers decide what siode of the war to fight, once they knew who was winning?

Give me a break. On the last day b4 the cease fire, HA launched over 200 rockets to Israel and you call your story a successfull mission? Anyway, U may have won this battle but certainly not the war.

One of dark sides of the democracies is empty selfflagellation. IDF did a tremendous job in fighting the ghost enemy who would claim his victory even no one of Hisbullah gunmen would stay alive, just hidden well (in Syria? in Iran?) Nasrallah. It is the same thing communists propaganda had used in the past. They were able to claim the eastern plastic car Trabant (a real joke) is better then BMW etc. Please, be wise in Isreael today, how you speak about the situation. Learn from mistakes but do not fall into a defetism in the time of this crisis. Come close to God and He will make you even stronger. Thank you for fighting even for our freedom here in Europe. Not many people realize it here.