Their days of glory are behind them; far, far behind them. This is from the New York Times: "While the Israeli military is normally quick to publicize its successes — sometimes even providing videos of the raids through eerie green night-vision lenses — scant details of the commando raid near the Hezbollah stronghold of Baalbek were disclosed. An official statement released by the army said, “The goals of the operation were achieved in full.” But in the Lebanese village of Boudai, residents gave graphic accounts yesterday of a commando force, wearing Lebanese Army uniforms and shouting in Arabic, that was chased down by local guerrillas and forced to evacuate by helicopter. The commandos were from the Sayeret Matkal, the Israeli news media reported, the country’s most elite, legendary and secretive unit, one that carried out, among other operations, the famous Entebbe raid to free hostages held on an airliner. Lt. Col. Emanuel Morano, who was apparently the leader of the force, put at about 100 men by the Israeli news media, was killed and another officer and a soldier were wounded. In Israel, it was widely assumed that the mission was considered highly important and involved something more than interdicting an effort to resupply Hezbollah with standard weaponry. Many of the reports in the Israeli news media centered on speculation that the raid was intended to gather intelligence or evidence about advanced, Russian-made weaponry sold to Syria and being sent into Lebanon for Hezbollah. In an analysis in the newspaper Yediot Aharonot, Alex Fishman wrote that Hezbollah had been using advanced Soviet-made antitank weapons. More than 10 days ago, he wrote, a legal opinion was written by lawyers reviewing the United Nations-backed cease-fire agreement “stipulating unequivocally” that attacks on Hezbollah weaponry would be classified as “an act of defense.” Whatever the purpose of the raid, most agreed it never would have been disclosed if the commandos had not run into serious difficulties. “Nobody was supposed to hear about the secret operation two days ago deep inside Lebanon, one of the secret operations the public is not told about,” the newspaper Maarivsaid. But, the paper added, “the mission got in trouble on the way.” The daily Haaretz quoted an unidentified military source as saying, “We were really lucky the operation did not end with 10 commandos killed.” Some commentators described the raid as another black mark for the Israeli military, already under severe criticism for its conduct of the Lebanon war. Writing in Yediot Aharonot, Amir Rappaport said, “The operation was intended to be absolutely secret and the mere fact that it was revealed and even claimed casualties is proof of its failure. “The skirmish between the commando troops and the Hezbollah fighters, which was not planned, also displays Israel to the world as though it violated the U.N. resolution. Absurdly enough, the mission that ran into trouble was also intended to allow Israel to provide proof later on that Syria, Hezbollah and Iran were not honoring the agreement.”" But Al-Akhbar newspaper in Beirut has a different account. It talks about a deliberate deception plan by Hizbullah. Hizbullah apparently lured those "commandos" by orchestrating a convoy of cars to mislead Israel into believing that Shaykh Muhammad Yazbak was in the area.