After the submission of the report by the preliminary Vinograd committee, it seems that the lessons from the previous campaign were not incorporated or implemented by the government.

In the introduction of the report the committee stated that this is the first war that Israel was involved in without any clear decision by the army. The main problem during the war was the gap between the objectives of the war and how they were to be achieved. The goals were: disarming Hezbollah, removing the threat of rockets from the country's home front and releasing the kidnapped soldiers. It is clear that these goals would not have been achieved without any ground support in Lebanon.

An interesting comment in the report refers to the political echelon's aversion to undertaking extended ground operations in Lebanon, a confidential decision against a wide scale ground operation and even the avoidance of such a decision. The military preparation for such action was done only two and a half weeks after the war began.

The report refers to a lack of realistic alternatives for achieving the goals that were settled upon other than an extended ground operation, and that such an operation would become a necessity.

The IDF estimated that there is no way of stopping the firing of Katyusha rockets but only with an extended ground operation.

During the wave of Palestinian terror attacks this strategy was favorable, there was the question of how to act, and when the decision of achieving the goal was made there was no escape from ground operations.

During the first war in Lebanon one of the most important achievements was to eliminate the missile threat. IDF proceeded to achieve its goals by using force. On the other hand, During the Second Lebanon War, similar to other asymmetric conflicts such as operations "Checks and Balances," and "Grapes of Wrath," the strategy of counter-fire and leverage of pressure of the civilian population were proven as non-effective.

It is difficult to reach a solution for the Qassams problem in Gaza by cutting electricity to the strip.

The fear of ground operation in the Second Lebanon War came from the fear of suffering many casualties, and the decision that was made was not only to forego winning the battle, but it was also a conscious and total desertion of the citizens of northern Israel and by this it reneged the state's obligation to take care of its citizens safety. This obligation is broken everyday by what happens to the citizens of Sderot.

This is the complete and conscious negligence of the citizens, and it is in place to wonder if the country would have reacted in the same way if those threats would have been against a different region.

Only a year and a half after the Intifada started the IDF undertook ground operations in enemy territory, meaning where the terrorists were hiding; only in this manner was it possible for Israel to win over the Palestinian terror.

The main lesson is that security and day to day routine remain in the hands of the government and the IDF is its tool for ensuring them.

The current situation in Sderot and around Gaza presents a change in attitude: civilians are used as bulletproof vests for the IDF. This attitude is destined to be a disaster.