Wooing Lebanese hearts, one leaflet at a time

Many of the remaining residents of southern Lebanon's war-torn towns are accustomed to the hollow thump of an explosion in the sky followed by hundreds of leaflets fluttering to streets like confetti.

They typically tell residents to leave before the bombs fall – an Israeli effort to avoid civilian casualties such as Sunday's killing of at least 65 in Qana. Head north of the Litani River "because of the terrorist activities that have been carried out against the State of Israel," they warn.

But other fliers fluttering down over Lebanon aim to foster Lebanese anger at Hizbullah, a much more ambitious effort than evacuating the country's Shiite south. Those depict Hassan Nasrallah as a cobra or show the Hizbullah chief cowering behind a shield bearing a picture of a Lebanese family.

Known as a "propaganda bomb" or by its slightly more euphemistic term, "airborne propaganda distribution," the technique of trying to sway civilians or combatants by flooding them with fliers has been around since World War II.

But today, what military-types dub psy-ops – or psychological operations – is also encompassing the technological advance of communication. Many Lebanese say they've been getting e-mails, text messages, and phone calls from Israel. One phone message said that Nasrallah had been badly wounded in an Israeli strike. Another claimed that people paid by Hizbullah were worried that they would no longer receive their monthly salaries.

But given the deep mistrust of Israel in Lebanon, many here and abroad wonder whether Israel is making an impact – be it in persuading the vulnerable to move or in winning hearts and minds in the campaign to discredit Hizbullah.

Hassan Dbouk, who works with the Tyre, Lebanon, municipality, says he received a phone call and heard a voice say, "This is the Israeli Army. We are about to increase our military operations in south Lebanon, and you are advised to leave immediately to north of the Litani." But Mr. Dbouk stayed.

"I think it's not very helpful, because the idea that the public will somehow exercise pressure on Hizbullah is baseless," says Moshe Maoz, an expert on Lebanon and Syria at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. "If we saw Israel just [striking at] the Hizbullah positions, fine," he says. But when civilians and civilian infrastructure are hit, "the public doesn't blame the Hizbullah for it – they simply hate Israel more."

Israeli officials say the leafleting does have an effect. First, argues Foreign Ministry Spokesman Mark Regev, it gets civilians to move away from the fighting. Second, he says, it sends a political message.

"Ultimately, our enemy is Hizbullah. Our enemy is not the Lebanese people," Mr. Regev says. "Hizbullah is not just holding two Israeli servicepeople hostage. Hizbullah is holding the Lebanese people hostage."

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