Explainer: Israel and Hezbollah

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Israel Regains Deterrence

What’s happened in Lebanon over the last two weeks will change the Middle East for decades. Israel has eliminated the leadership of the terrorist group Hezbollah without a ground invasion and with minimal civilian casualties. Though no one knows what the future looks like, Israel may have curbed the possibilities for what looked like an inevitable broader war in the region. 

After the Hamas raid on October 7, Hezbollah started shooting rockets almost daily into Israel. This continued a years-long struggle, which saw 80,000 Israelis relocate from Northern Israel to hotels across the country. 

In the last three weeks, Israel has eliminated the entire leadership structure of the Lebanese terrorist group Hezbollah. They killed more than 30 people and injured thousands by placing explosive devices in pagers that were delivered to Hezbollah leadership. The following week, walkie-talkies used by the group exploded, injuring 500 more. A strike in Beirut killed Hassan Nasrallah, who is responsible for terrorism across the world, including hundreds of American deaths. 

This morning, Adm. James Stavridis and Richard Haass joined Morning Joe to discuss the situation in Lebanon. Both doubted there would be a wider war, but also pointed out how muted Iran’s response has been to Israel destroying its proxies. One reason would be the nuclear program. Haass suggested that Iran might be willing to forfeit its proxies near Israel for the ability to obtain a nuclear weapon to use against Israel. This tradeoff would further the goal of having forces like Hezbollah and Hamas in the first place, eliminating Israel.

One other point answered a question many people are asking: How has Israel eliminated the leadership of Hezbollah with such ease when the leader of Hamas is still alive? It comes down to two factors that both illuminate the situation. First, Israeli intelligence is clearly far better in Lebanon than in Gaza. Counterintuitively, Israel has struck with far more precision and accuracy in Lebanon and Iran than in Gaza. The fact that they were caught so off-guard on October 7 just demonstrates this further. One reason might be the cooperation of the Lebanese compared to the Palestinians. As Stavridis suggests, the people of Lebanon likely have far less allegiance to Hezbollah and wouldn’t mind having them taken out of power. The line between the Palestinians - who elected Hamas to power - is more blurry. Hamas is seen as a liberation force, and their arguments have taken root on the left and on college campuses in the U.S. Hezbollah is not. 

Second, Israel has been preparing for war with Hezbollah for a long time. The infiltration of the supply chain and the intelligence necessary for the precision pager strike came from years of work. It’s been reported that defense ministry Yoav Gallant favored striking Hezbollah preemptively in October but was overruled by the rest of the war cabinet. Clearly, Hezbollah has been seen as the more important foe. They have more than 130,000 missiles at their disposal and have the ability to overwhelm Israel’s Iron Dome. 

Here is some of the best analysis of the situation from around the web: 

In a colloquium of six experts hits various aspects of the war. Niall Ferguson argues that there is not really a war going on, because Israel has acted first and restored deterrence. “This week, Israel has shown its enemies that it is still smarter than they are. If they can do this, what else might they have in store for Iran and its terrorist surrogates? The very fact that such a question has to be asked constitutes a notable victory in the war that is no war.”

In the same group, Mosab Hassan Yousef wonders about the implications for the future of Lebanon; “These types of pinpoint strikes avoid conflict with the Lebanese people, but degrade Hezbollah’s terrorist infrastructure. The group’s dominance in Lebanon has stifled the country’s political freedom, turning what was once a prosperous neighbor into a battlefield for Iranian influence. Lebanese citizens deserve the chance to be free of Hezbollah’s malign influence and pursue the democratic values that were so briefly realized during the Cedar Revolution.” 

In Foreign Affairs, Andrew P. Miller argues that the U.S. needs a new strategy to prevent a larger war; “With time being of the essence, Washington must overhaul its diplomatic approach. It needs to undertake a much more proactive shuttle diplomacy aimed at ending the war in the next several weeks. The painstaking, patient diplomacy of the U.S. administration and its fellow mediators, Qatar and Egypt, has failed to push Israel and Hamas, and particularly their recalcitrant leaders, across the finish line. High-profile shuttle diplomacy, though risky, can concentrate and magnify pressure, increasing the likelihood that the parties will feel compelled to take difficult decisions. If accompanied by other sources of pressure, it could prove a game changer. Biden should immediately dispatch Secretary of State Antony Blinken to the region to shuttle between Israel, Egypt, and Qatar for as many days as necessary to close all remaining gaps in the Gaza cease-fire deal. That goal will also require that Washington both intensify its political, diplomatic, and military pressure on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and work with Arab partners to isolate Hamas and further squeeze its political and military leadership.” 

Writing for the Council on Foreign Relations, Bruce Hoffman weighs the impact of Nasrallah’s death; “Iran has in essence sat by and watched its most important and most powerful proxy in the region be degraded, attritted, and humiliated by Israel. The loss of Iran’s own political leader earlier this year alongside its systemic conventional military weakness—and therefore its longstanding need to rely on proxies like Hezbollah, Hamas, and the Yemen-based Houthis—suggests that Iran has little ability to seriously threaten Israel. Last April’s feeble missile attack on Israel clearly showed that.”

“Finally, a good outcome for Israel will be if Nasrallah’s killing, together with its systemic degrading of Hezbollah’s leadership and command and control capabilities, enables Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to avoid having to launch a potentially protracted and debilitating ground offensive in Lebanon. In addition to saving civilian lives and further damaging Lebanon’s already-fragile economy and infrastructure as well as incurring more international opprobrium, Netanyahu would, critically, also avoid likely IDF casualties and escape another potential military quagmire.” 

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Dr. Cole Feix is the founder and president of So We Speak and the Senior Pastor of Carlton Landing Community Church in Oklahoma.