THE most important equipment Israeli commandos took with them in a daring weekend raid in the Lebanese city of Tyre may have been video cameras.
In the wake of successful efforts by Hezbollah to film their attacks on Israeli outposts in order to promote their fighting image among friend and foe, the Israelis have accepted they are involved in a war in which image is no less important than substance.
The raid on Tyre, like another last week in the Bekaa Valley more than 100km north of Israel's border, was filmed on the ground and from helicopters and the results were publicised.
Lucky for the Israelis they've started doing this. Otherwise the BBC would get away with this:
The need for such authentication was demonstrated in the aftermath of the Tyre raid, when a BBC journalist stationed there reported as fact what Hezbollah had told him -- that the raiders had landed by helicopter "and walked right into a Hezbollah ambush".
A few hours later, Israel released videos showing the raiders, a naval commando unit, stealthily approaching the apartment building that was their target and surrounding it before dawn.
An officer who participated said their objective was the commanders of Hezbollah's long-range rocket team. The three Hezbollah officers were living in an apartment on the second floor of a five-storey building. The commander of the Israeli team was the first to burst in.
In the shootout, all occupants of the apartment were killed but the Israeli commander was shot through his lungs, another commando was also seriously injured and six others wounded lightly by grenade fragments.
Carrying the two wounded men on stretchers, the commandos were attacked by several groups of Hezbollah fighters who came out of nearby buildings.
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