Islamofascism's 1936

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HAIFA, Israel. -- Some have suggested the latest round of fighting between Israel and the Iranian-backed Hezbollah organization in Lebanon is the beginning of World War III. But a better analogy may be the 1936 Spanish Civil War.

Just as Adolf Hitler used Francisco Franco as his proxy in Spain to test new military techniques and equipment on the battlefield, so Iran is using Hezbollah as its proxy to do the same.

Israeli ground troops have been finding Hezbollah is no longer a rag-tag guerrilla group, but a veritable terrorist army, trained and equipped by Iran.

"Hezbollah understands complex military tactics. They are pursuing combined military operations using ground forces, missiles, intelligence and the media," said Daniel Seaman, an Israeli government spokesman.

Over the last six years, following Israel's unilateral withdrawal from south Lebanon, Iran began supplying Hezbollah with massive quantities of long-range artillery rockets of a type never before used against Israel. These Iranian-made Fajr-3 rockets have a range of 43 kilometers, and carry a 50-kilogram warhead packed with thousands of deadly ballbearings. These are terrorist mass-kill weapons, designed to kill as many civilians as possible. No one standing within a 50-meter radius of one of these incoming rocket can survive, Israeli bomb experts say. The Fajr-3 was used with great success in a July 16 attack that killed eight railway workers at a repair depot in downtown Haifa.

Israeli military intelligence estimates that at the start of the current onslaught. Hezbollah possessed more than 10,000 of Fajr-3 and similar long-range rockets. How many terrorist groups can boast of such an arsenal?

Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni explained Hezbollah's aims with stark clarity here last week. "While Israel is targeting Hezbollah, and during this operation, unfortunately it can lead to loss of civilian life, Hezbollah is targeting our cities in order to hit, in order to target civilians and to target Israeli population centers. This is a crucial difference."

Iran is testing Israel, probing Israel's reaction to the rocket attacks. Iran also is testing international community's response, as it prepares for a future war.

Anyone who has watched television over the last two weeks has probably heard the eerie wail of the air raid sirens that go off many times each day in Haifa and in smaller towns and settlements across northern Israel.

As many as 500,000 Israelis have fled the war zone. Most of Israel north of Haifa is deserted, while those remaining live in underground shelters.