Israel, Iran, and Hezbollah manoeuvre in military and political minefields

 

Credit: Globely News

By James M. Dorsey

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Hezbollah and Iran are playing political and military defence in Lebanon.

Militarily, Hezbollah has demonstrated that it may be down but is not out as a result of Israeli body blows in recent weeks, including the September 27 killing of its leader, Hassan Nasrallah.

This week, Hezbollah successfully fired medium-range missile barrages at Tel Aviv and the Israeli port city of Haifa. Hezbollah fighters have also stood their ground in fighting back Israeli incursions into southern Lebanon.

It was unclear whether Hezbollah was refraining from deploying its long-range precision-guided missiles to avoid further escalation or whether Israel had successfully targeted its arsenal.

Meanwhile, Iran braced for a likely Israeli strike in retaliation for the Islamic Republic’s recent missile attack on military and intelligence targets near Tel Aviv that could determine whether hostilities escalate into an all-out Middle East war.

Credit: Washington Institute for Near East Policy

At the same time, Iran appeared determined to maintain its network of non-state actors as its primary frontline in confronting Israel.

In practice, this mainly meant beyond Hezbollah Yemen’s Houthi rebels, who have disrupted Red Sea shipping and lobbed missiles and drones at Israel, forcing it to effectively close its southern port of Eilat.

In a potential indication of the setbacks, Hezbollah suffered because of Israeli attacks on the group’s communications and weapon depots and targeting of its political and military leadership, Houthi and Iraqi drone and missile experts headed to Lebanon to support Hezbollah, according to Elijah J. Magnier, a pro-Hezbollah military analyst.

Even so, Syria, a key member of the Iranian-backed network, and Iraq, home to a host of Iran-friendly militias, scrambled to remain on the sidelines of the escalating conflict.

More fundamentally, the network, dubbed the Axis of Resistance, has little to show for itself a year into the Gaza war beyond adding to the economic cost of Israel’s war in Gaza.

Attacks by Hezbollah, the Houthis, and Iraqi groups failed to deter Israeli military operations in Gaza, the West Bank, Lebanon or Syria or limit its battlefield objectives despite forcing the 60,000 Israelis to evacuate their homes along Israel’s northern border and shutting down Eilat.

On the contrary, the attacks offered Israel an opportunity to settle scores with Hezbollah at significant cost to the movement and Lebanon.

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi (left) meets Lebanese Acting Prime Minister Najib Mikati (right). Credit: Al-Manar

None of this justifies Israel’s war conduct nor does it suggest that Israel has been able to achieve anything more than short-term battlefield and intelligence successes at a horrendous human and political cost.

Nevertheless, with the cost/benefit analysis of the Axis’ year of confronting Israel in support of Hamas calling its strategy into question, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi rushed to Beirut last week to defeat Lebanese attempts to delink the Gaza and Lebanon wars.

Insisting that a truce in Lebanon could not be achieved without a ceasefire in Gaza, Mr. Araghchi was responding to Acting Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati's endorsement of a US-led call for an immediate 21-day halt to the fighting in Lebanon.

Mr. Araghchi sought to capitalise on the fact that by killing Mr. Nasrallah, Israel may have squashed hopes for a Lebanon ceasefire independent of developments in Gaza.

In the days before his death, Mr. Nasrallah signalled his willingness to give a Gaza ceasefire a chance by tentatively agreeing to a temporary halt of hostilities on Israel’s northern border.

However, contrary to Lebanese government assertions, Mr. Nasrallah insisted that his acceptance of a ceasefire did not decouple the Gaza and Lebanon wars. On the contrary, maintaining a truce would depend on halting the war in Gaza.

Mr. Nasrallah unilaterally launched Hezbollah’s war of attrition against Israel a day after last year’s Hamas October 7 attack on the Jewish state. He consistently insisted Hezbollah would halt hostilities only when Israel agrees to a ceasefire in Gaza.

Mr. Nasrallah’s killing may have undermined his more conciliatory approach.

Lebanese American scholar Assad AbuKhalil quoted Imad Mughniyeh, Hezbollah’s notorious military commander who was assassinated in 2008, as saying about concern at the time that Mr. Nasrallah may be killed, “They would have taken out the most reasonable among us.”

Analyst Mouin Rabbani suggested the fallout of Mr. Nasrallah’s removal was already visible. Mr. Rabbani described Hezbollah’s latest missile barrage targeting Haifa as a “deliberately indiscriminate attack” that “reflects the absence of Hassan Nasrallah, who considered insulating his constituents from the conflict with Israel a priority… His successors are likely to prioritise retribution,” Mr. Rabbani said.

Mr. Nasrallah’s presumed successor, Hashem Safieddine, who Israel may have killed in last week’s bombing of Beirut’s southern suburbs, is/was a hardline proponent of violence with close ties to Iran.

In that vein, Hezbollah deputy leader Naim Qassem, exuding confidence, insisted on Tuesday in a defiant broadcast that Hezbollah remained a force to be reckoned with despite the Israeli body blows.

“Our capabilities are intact. The leadership, command and control, and administration of the party function… We have no vacuum… We have increased our missile attacks and expanded the battlefield… Israel has achieved nothing in the seven days” since it launched its ground offensive. Mr. Qassem said.

Naim Qassem speaks

To drive the point home, Hezbollah launched shortly after Mr. Qassem’s speech a second barrage of 100 missiles towards Haifa, the largest to target the city since hostilities erupted a year ago.

Mr. Qassem said Israel’s offensive, rather than allowing the 60,000 Israelis to return to their settlements along the border with Lebanon, would force more Israelis to evacuate their homes.

Mr. Qassem supported Parliament speaker Nabih Berri, a veteran Shiite Muslim politician, in his quest to find a political solution to the Lebanese conflict, suggesting that Hezbollah would not backtrack on Mr. Nasrallah’s acquiescence.

Mr. Berri is the United States and France's contact point for indirect talks with Hezbollah aimed at achieving a temporary ceasefire and implementing United Nations Security Council resolution 1701.

Adopted in 2006 after the last Lebanese war, the resolution calls for the withdrawal of Hezbollah to the Litani River, 30 kilometres north of the Lebanon-Israeli border, the deployment of the Lebanese army in the border region, and the pullback of Israeli troops from disputed Lebanese territory.

“We support Berri’s political moves to reach a ceasefire. Everything can be discussed, but only once there is a ceasefire. We are not begging for a ceasefire… We are willing to sacrifice,” Mr. Qassem said. However, Mr. Qassem insisted that Hezbollah would not disarm.

Mr. Araghchi, the Iranian foreign minister, may not have to worry about Mr. Mikati’s endorsement of the US-French ceasefire proposal while Mr. Berri may not have anything to negotiate.

French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot. Source: Instagram

Mr. Mikati complained this week that the United States, France, and other supporters of the ceasefire plan were no longer actively promoting it.

French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot barely mentioned the plan on a recent visit to the Middle East, focusing instead on the need to strengthen Lebanese institutions, including the Lebanese army.

Accusing Hezbollah of unilaterally dragging Lebanon into an unwarranted confrontation with Israel, Lebanese opposition forces backed Mr. Mikati’s decoupling of Lebanon and Gaza and Mr. Barrot’s approach.

In a statement, the opposition insisted that the Lebanese army take control of the country’s borders.

The opposition further called for the speedy election by parliament of a new president after Hezbollah appeared willing to drop its demand that the next president should be a Christian ally of the group.

Hezbollah’s move could break the deadlock that has stalled the election for the past two years.

“It is time to transform our national tragedy into a ‘historic opportunity’ to finally break out of the cycle of repeating the past and its mistakes, to return to a common word to build together a homeland of freedom, partnership and human dignity, a state of sovereignty, justice and law,” the opposition said.

Dr. James M. Dorsey is an Adjunct Senior Fellow at Nanyang Technological University’s S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies, and the author of the syndicated column and podcast, The Turbulent World with James M. Dorsey.