Under the guise of a patriotic educational endeavor, the Hizbullah terrorist organization has begun selling a new computer video game enabling youngsters to re-enact Hizbullah's war against Israel last summer. Hizbullah has also opened a new museum in Beirut to eternalize its "victory."
The new game, named "Special Force 2" - a sequel to a similar game of a few years ago dubbed "Special Force" - involves various anti-Israel missions of increasing difficulty. The first mission is to kidnap Israeli soldiers, in the style of the abduction of Eldad Regev and Ehud Goldwasser that kicked off last year's Second Lebanon War. Imitating the events as they actually happened, the player must aim a missile at two IDF jeeps, hit at least one of them, and must then penetrate the border fence to capture the soldiers.
In addition, players undergo training, fire Katyusha rockets against Israeli towns, and participate in guerilla battles in Lebanese villages - just as happened in last year's war. The objective: to "cleanse" the villages of Israeli soldiers.
The Arabic language daily Al-Sharq Al-Awsat of London quotes Ali Saher, responsible for Hizbullah information operations, as saying, "The Lebanese child has the right to know what happened in the South [of Lebanon] and thus to emulate the operations of jihad and liberation of land."
Another goal of the game, Saher said, is to counter Western culture, which has "empty content and cheap goals... [This game] contains violence, [but] it also has a message and principles... We are not producing a game that has nothing more than violence. The difference is that a child will not be playing a pointless game with no point and no message."
The game will be sold, for only ten dollars, in Syria, Bahrain, and the United Arab Emirates.
Hizbullah Museum in Beirut
Hizbullah has vowed to continue the war against Israel, but is at present constrained by UNIFIL and the Lebanese Army - which occupy southern Lebanon and the border area with Israel - to operating only on the training, weapons stocking-up and propaganda fronts. In Beirut, a new Hizbullah museum showcases the "victory" over Israel last year, complete with captured Israeli tanks and aircraft, a display of Hizbullah weapons and tactics, diagrams of the latest Iranian and Russian anti-tank rocketry, and the "Special Force 2" video game.
In addition, a plaque lists every Israeli warplane that bombed Lebanon last year - including the squadron ID and home base of each one.
The museum also features a full-scale recreation of a front-line bunker, complete with computer workstation, prayer rug and even a dish rack.
The ambience is one of bragging and boastfulness, notes a report in Lebanon's Ya Libnan, with an emphasis on Israeli casualties in mannequin form and apparent Israeli incompetence. "We will eradicate Hizbullah within three days," trumpets former IDF Chief of Staff Dan Halutz while next to him, former Defense Minister Amir Peretz looks through a pair of binoculars with the lens caps still on.