It appears that Israel made several strategic mistakes in the conduct of this campaign, but I wasn't aware of that their Army was in such disarray until recently, and it “may” explain why Israel relied so heavily on air power in this fight, resulting a propaganda or moral defeat for Israel in much of the West and probably all of the Arab world.

This appears to be another situation where capable leadership was ignored and Air Power / technical enthusiasts won the day (but lost the battle) in Israel’s decision making process. There is no doubt in my mind that Israel has numerous experts in conducting this type of fight, but they clearly were ignored.

Israel’s tactics resulted in very little damage to Hezbollah’s militia and actually helped Hezbollah politically. Furthermore the air attacks did very little to stop the rocket attacks on Israel. Ideally, Hezbollah should have been fought mano a mano with infantry, and probably with an amphibious assault to the north to conduct a pincher moment to block their escape routes. This would have been a bloodier fight, but it would have demonstrated Israeli political will and capability. Furthermore, since Hezbollah is state sponsored (not by Lebanon), then Iran should have at least received two black eyes and a fat lip as a warning they have going too far. What we have now is a narrative on the Arab street where Israel used their Air Force to kill hundreds of innocent Lebanese civilians (true), and that their infantry couldn’t defeat the Hezbollah fighters.

Now that the initial kinetic fight is over, the real battle for victory begins. While I think the Hezbollah can be still be defeated (I don’t mean totally, but significantly weakened) by the Lebanon and the West (Israel should be sitting this one out now), it will be extremely challenging. Hezbollah has many advantages:

1. The Lebanese people hate Israel for what they did to Lebanon.
2. The Hezbollah has an established chain of command and a strategy that they are implementing now (they’re inside our OODA loop).
3. Hezbollah is perceived as credible on the battlefield (the Lebanese in S. Lebanon trust them).
4. Hezbollah has an established infrastructure throughout Lebanon and will operate with information superiority.

We on the other hand must rapidly introduce UN peace enforcement forces to facilitate Lebanon's Army in disarming the Hezbollah, which they can't do on their own. If the West and Israel can take the lead in the IO war (it will be hard after Israel's moral set back) and convince the people of Lebanon that the Hezbollah are the source of their problems and they are delaying the rebuilding the Southern Lebanon, then just maybe we can turn this into a victory. However, we have to form a coalition, work under a UN bureaucracy, and the ultimate key to success is an under funded, under equipped and poorly trained Lebanese Army.

If I was Israel I would put an old war horse in charge of fixing their Army, they are going to need it soon.