South Lebanon Army
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The South Lebanon Army (SLA), also "South Lebanese Army," (Arabic: ; transliterated: Jaysh Lubnān al-Janūbiyy. Hebrew: ; transliterated: Tzvá Dróm Levanón, Tzadál) was a Lebanese militia during the Lebanese Civil War. It collaborated with Israel during the Israeli military invasion of South Lebanon.
History
The SLA was founded in 1976 by members of the Lebanese army based in the town of Marjayoun and Qlayaa. Its members were mainly Christians who resented the armed Palestinian factions which controlled South Lebanon at the time. Its stated aim was to protect Lebanese civilians from the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO)[[Citing sources citation needed]]. The SLA was composed of Christians, Shiites and Druzes from the areas that it controlled. Having a common enemy in the PLO, the SLA and Israel quickly formed an alliance.Its first leader was Major Saad Haddad. Following Haddad's death due to cancer in 1984, he was replaced as leader by Antoine Lahad (a retired lieutenant general).
The SLA was closely allied with Israel. It supported the Israelis by combatting the PLO in the strip of Southern Lebanon until the Israeli invasion to Lebanon in 1982. After that, SLA support for the Israelis was mainly by fighting against other Lebanese guerilla forces lead by Hezbollah until 2000 in the Security Zone, the area of the South kept under occupation after the partial Israeli withdrawal in 1985. In return, Israel supplied the organisation with arms, uniforms, and other logistical equipment.
In 1985 the SLA opened a detention center in Khiam. It was widely reported that torture occurred on a large scale in Khiam. Israel rejects any involvement, and claims that Khiam was the sole responsibility of the SLA: this has been contested by human rights organizations such as Amnesty International [link]. The SLA also applied a mandatory military service program where males over 18 living in the Security Zone were forced to serve a whole year as a military recruit.[[Citing sources citation needed]] The SLA has constantly received fundings, weapons and logistics from Israel.
During the 1990s, Hezbollah carried out increasingly effective attacks on it, aided in later years by Lebanese army intelligence which had thoroughly penetrated the SLA. These changed circumstances led to a progressive loss of morale and members. By 2000, the SLA was reduced to 1,500 fighters as compared to 3,000 ten years earlier. In its peak during the early 1980s, the SLA was comprised of over 5,000 fighters.
Since there were only 1,000 to 1,200 Israeli troops in South Lebanon at one time [link], the SLA carried out the bulk of Israel's fighting. The SLA also handled all civilian governmental operations in Israel's zone of control.
Collapse of the SLA
In May 2000, Israeli forces withdrew suddenly from the occupied zone without having given any warning to the SLA. As the withdrawal became obvious, civilians from the occupied zone overran SLA positions to return to their villages, while Hezbollah members quickly took control of the areas the SLA had previously controlled. The SLA, taken unawares by the Israeli withdrawal, collapsed in the face of the crowds and of Hezbollah's rapid advance.Domont and Charrara, Le Hezbollah: un mouvement Islamo-nationaliste Many members, some with their families, fled to Israel, while others gave themselves up to the Lebanese authorities, or were taken prisoner by Hezbollah who handed them over to the police. SLA members captured by Lebanon and Hezbollah were tried as collaborators with the enemy; the bulk of those found guilty received short prison terms, while a small number convicted of serious offences against civilians were sentenced to longer terms of hard labour.Palmer-Harek, Judith, Hezbollah: the Changing Face of Terrorism, London, IB Tauris. Most members of the SLA who were suspected of such offences, however, had fled to Israel. A number of members were also granted asylum in European countries, mostly in Germany.[[Citing sources citation needed]] Hezbollah was also criticised for preventing the arrest of some members of the SLA; it justified this on the grounds that it was in a position to know which of them had been passing information to the resistance.Palmer-Harek, Judith, Hezbollah: the Changing Face of Terrorism, London, IB Tauris. Israeli prime minister Ehud Barak was criticised in Israel on the grounds that his decision to withdraw without consulting his SLA allies led to the rapidity and confusion of its collapse.[[Citing sources citation needed]]
Although many SLA members and families eventually chose to return from Israel to Lebanon after Hezbollah promised they would not be harmed, others accepted Israel's offer of full citizenship and a financial package similar to that granted to new immigrants, and settled permanently in Israel. On April 6, 2006, the Israeli Knesset Finance Committee approved the payment of NIS 40,000 per family to SLA veterans to be paid over the course of seven years.
References
External links
- [The quandary of an SLA amnesty] - The Daily Star, August 16, 2005
Sources
- Le Hezbollah: un mouvement Islamo-nationaliste, Frédéric Domont and Walid Charrara, Editions Fayard: Paris, 2004 ISBN 2213620091
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