Win a Battle and Lose a Political War

One of Israel's greatest assets has traditionally been its image as a beleaguered nation in a sea of hostile enemies and its corresponding claim to moral superiority. But as their forces closed in relentlessly on the P.L.O. in West Beirut, and television screens around the world showed numbing images of death and destruction, the Israeli government and people feared that the international view of their country was swiftly changing. Israel was rightly concerned that having won the battle in Lebanon, it might still lose the political war in the living rooms of Europe and the U.S.

Last week a poll conducted by the Associated Press and NBC News in the U.S. confirmed Israel's fears, revealing that 51% of those surveyed disapproved of the Israeli invasion of Lebanon, compared with 25% who supported the move. More to the point, 59% felt that Israel had gone too far in its attacks on Beirut, while only 7% said the level of force was appropriate.

In the European press, the image of Israel as an aggrieved nation has been transformed into that of an avenging juggernaut. Newspapers in Paris have termed Begin a "fascist" warmonger. The West German press, which has traditionally gone out of its way to avoid criticism of Israel, has begun to criticize Begin's belligerency. Die Zeit has decried the Israeli "bloodbath" as going beyond what could be justified as the "eye for an eye" justice of the Old Testament.

Faced with this kind of comment, Prime Minister Begin argued that his country's aggressive attacks were necessary to reduce casualties among Israelis, Said Begin: "Given a choice between dead Jews and a good press, and living Jews and a bad press, I would prefer the latter." But worried Israeli politicians held investigations into charges that government spokesmen were responsible for the unfavorable coverage because of their mishandling of the press. The investigations were inconclusive, but the Foreign Ministry believes that the army's heavyhanded treatment of reporters in the first week of the war tended to make them more sympathetic to the P.L.O. viewpoint.

The most serious charge by the Israelis against the world press is that it too readily accepted claims of civilian deaths reported by the P.L.O. and mistakenly, if not maliciously, charged the Israelis with committing acts of cruelty. A prime case in point was the photograph of a badly burned baby who United Press International said had been the victim of an accidental Israeli bomb drop in East Beirut. President Reagan cited the picture in his talks with Israeli Foreign Minister Yitzhak Shamir as an example of why Jerusalem had to stop the bombing of the city. In their defense the Israelis claim that no bomb had fallen in East Beirut and that the child, in truth, had been hit by a P.L.O. shell. Although the U.P.I, stood by the accuracy of its caption, the news agency was looking further into the matter.