POLITICS
Over the last month, the Israeli armed forces managed to eliminate not only the leader of the Hezbollah terrorist group, Hassan Nasrallah, but also two of his potential successors. By some estimates, Hezbollah has lost up to half of its combat missile capability, along with the entirety of its top military leadership. These developments could overturn the balance of power in Lebanon — and with it, that of the wider Middle East. With Hezbollah weakened, a chance has emerged for the political leadership in Beirut to return their country to its constitutional secular system of government. But if it fails, the country may find itself on the edge of a new civil war.
History repeats itself
Nearly half a century ago, the “Palestine question” triggered a civil war in Lebanon. In the early 1970s, the country became a base for the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), which staged its forays into Israel from Lebanese territory. Many political forces, especially the Christians of southern Lebanon, resented the PLO’s presence. In 1975, clashes in Beirut between Palestinian fighters and the militia of the Christian party Kataib (Lebanese Phalanx) marked the beginning of a civil war that ultimately involved all of Lebanon’s various political forces.
The fifteen years of bloodshed resulted in tens of thousands of deaths, Israeli occupation of Lebanon's south, and Syria's almost complete control over the rest of Lebanon’s territory. Many of the repercussions of that war remain pertinent to this day.
Now the situation is repeating itself. In response to the Oct. 7 Hamas terrorist attack, Israel launched a military operation in the Gaza Strip. In turn, Hamas called on all so-called “resistance forces” to join its fight against the “occupiers.” These include the Houthi movement Ansar Allah, a collection of Iraqi Shiite groups, and, of course, Lebanese Hezbollah, which began shelling Israeli targets as early as Oct. 8, 2023.
Hezbollah has stated that its attacks will continue until Israel ends its war in the Gaza Strip. Israel responded in kind, but for almost a year neither side crossed the other’s “red lines,” refraining from strikes against infrastructure and limiting their attacks to the border area, where civilians have been among the casualties. The turning point came on Jul. 27, when a Hezbollah strike claimed the lives of 12 Israeli children and teenagers in the Druze town of Majdal Shams in the Golan Heights.
A missile fired by Hezbollah killed 12 children and teenagers playing in a playground
In response, a Jul. 30 Israeli strike on Beirut's southern suburbs killed Hezbollah military commander Fuad Shukr, who is believed to have been behind the Majdal Shams attack. The next day, news came from Tehran of the assassination of Hamas Political Bureau chief Ismail Haniyeh. Israel took responsibility only for the Beirut attack, but few in the region doubted the authorship of the Tehran operation. Despite the calls of the anti-Israeli “resistance forces” for an immediate response, Iran did not want to ignite a war.
International mediators had been working for months to forestall a full-scale confrontation. In April, when Tehran launched dozens of rockets and drones toward Israeli territory in response to the assassination of an Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps brigadier general, the U.S. persuaded the Israelis to show restraint. Washington tried to persuade Israel not to escalate with Hezbollah either. However, at least as far as Lebanon is concerned, these latter efforts failed.
In mid-September, Israel's leadership decided to do everything possible so that residents of the north, who had been living in evacuation for almost a year, could return home. The confrontation with Hezbollah, located just across the border, heated up yet again.
In the weeks that followed, Israel inflicted serious damage on the Iranian-backed Lebanese group, killing and wounding many military commanders — including the organization's general secretary, Hassan Nasrallah. No one in the region expected attacks on such a scale. Not even the Second Lebanon War in 2006 had featured targeted operations against Hezbollah leaders.
How will this new war end? How far will Israel go? So far, Washington doesn't appear to mind Israel's crackdown on Hezbollah. In fact, the Americans and their allies appear to hope that Israeli actions will bring about a reduction of Iranian influence in the region.
The rise and fall of Hezbollah
Hezbollah was established in the early 1980s, amidst the Lebanese Civil War, by a group of Shiite community leaders with financial and organizational backing from Iran. By the 2020s, Hassan Nasrallah estimated Hezbollah’s assets to include roughly 100,000 fighters (although outside experts estimated the group's strength at half that number). Since Israeli forces’ unilateral withdrawal in 2000, Hezbollah has established near-total control over southern Lebanon.
Hassan Nasrallah held onto power for three decades
The group’s main instrument of influence on domestic politics is the engagement of the Shiite community through charitable aid, educational programs for children, and healthcare services. The south of Lebanon, the southern suburbs of Beirut, and the Beqaa Valley — areas with a predominantly Shiite population — have evolved into a near-autonomous Hezbollah state, one complete with its own army and security service. At the official level, Hezbollah promoted its agenda through loyal deputies and ministers, building alliances with an array of political forces.
All of this was possible thanks to the fact that, according to the rating published by Forbes Israel, Hezbollah ranks among the world's richest terrorist organizations. Early in 2022, it came in third, behind only the Taliban and Ansar Allah, with annual revenues of $1.2 billion, a sum larger than the Lebanese government’s budgeted expenditures for the year.
Hezbollah’s initial investment came from Iran, which allocates roughly $700-800 million a year to its Lebanese “allies.” Additionally, Iran supplies Hezbollah with oil, food, and medicine, strengthening its position inside Lebanon.
Another source of Hezbollah’s income is drug trafficking from Latin America to Europe and the U.S., as well as counterfeiting, arms dealing, and the smuggling of diamonds and other commodities. Money is laundered through a smattering of charities, real estate agencies, car dealerships, and other companies within Hezbollah’s financial empire.
The combination of foreign influence and domestic mismanagement that allowed Hezbollah to grow has brought the Lebanese state to the brink of collapse on multiple occasions.
Political crisis in Lebanon
Demands for political and economic reform sounded in Lebanon in 2015 after ecologists succeeded in closing down a landfill. No alternative waste disposal site was found, and the resulting “garbage crisis” persisted for almost a year.
A larger wave of protests rose in October 2019 following the introduction of new taxes to patch holes in the budget. The final straw for Lebanese society was a monthly six-dollar tax on the use of WhatsApp.
The protests quickly became political, sweeping through every major city from north to south and ending in the resignation of Prime Minister Saad Hariri's government. However, its replacement lasted only a year, and it saw the situation in the country go from bad to worse when the coronavirus pandemic dealt a blow to Lebanon's already struggling economy, triggering the “protests of the hungry.”
Just when it looked like things could not possibly get any worse, in August 2020 an explosion in Beirut's port claimed the lives of more than 200 people while injuring thousands. The blast wave destroyed dozens of buildings and blew out windows and doors in countless more. The cause of the explosion was 2,750 tons of ammonium nitrate stored in the warehouse after being confiscated by customs services in 2014. The international community expressed its willingness to assist Lebanon’s cleanup and recovery efforts, but in exchange, it demanded economic reform — including a crackdown on corruption.
Damage from the Beirut port explosion is estimated at more than $15 billion
But the political infighting continued, and by 2022, Lebanon had the second-highest inflation rate in the world (162.4%), behind only Zimbabwe (280.4%). The drop in GDP amounted to 20.3% in 2020, 10.5% in 2021, and 5.4% in 2022. There was hope that Lebanon would break out of the vicious cycle after its parliamentary elections in May 2022, but government formation was once again delayed as politicians competed for ministerial posts.
Government formation was further complicated by Lebanon’s division of political power along religious lines: the president of Lebanon is always from the Maronite Christian community, the prime minister is a Sunni, and the speaker of parliament is a Shiite. Balance must also be maintained in the allocation of ministerial positions, which are almost always assigned to one community or another (although occasionally some portfolios are passed back and forth). As a result, the composition of a government is decided over the course of long bargaining sessions involving a variety of political camps.
In the latest instance when a compromise was finally reached, there was no one to approve the government. President Michel Aoun's term of office had expired at the end of October 2022, and a new president is yet to be elected, as Hezbollah vetoed all candidates except Suleiman Frangieh, the leader of the friendly Al Marada Movement.
This did not sit well with Hezbollah's opponents. The 12th and latest attempt to elect a president was made in June 2023, after which the war in the Middle East sidelined the issue. However, now that Lebanon is plunging into a new war, its lack of a president has taken on greater significance.
President wanted
In early October, the American website Axios, citing sources in Washington, reported that the White House sought to take advantage of Israel's massive strike on Hezbollah's leadership and infrastructure by pushing for the election of a Lebanese president — one who would not advance the interests of the Shiite group and its allies.
“We have made clear for some time that we think the Lebanese government needs to overcome the dysfunction in the system — one of the primary instigators of that dysfunction being the Hezbollah veto over who the next president would be — and elect a president,” Axios quoted U.S. State Department spokesman Matthew Miller as saying.
According to the constitution, Lebanon is a parliamentary republic. It is the prime minister's prerogative to deal with major domestic and foreign policy issues, including international negotiations and agreements. However, the president heads the Supreme Defense Council and is commander-in-chief of the armed forces. Without the president's signature, the government has no authority, for example, to negotiate a ceasefire.
The U.S., France, and several Arab countries hope to see the current commander of the Lebanese Armed Forces, Gen. Joseph Aoun, move into the role of president. As mediators believe, this would reinforce the position of the Lebanese army as a key actor in stabilizing the country after the war.
At the moment, the army is the only entity that still enjoys the population’s trust, but it has not had the resources so far to confront Hezbollah. The economic crisis has become critical for the army, and Lebanese military personnel only receive their salaries thanks to Qatari aid. Doha has even provided them with food assistance. What military capabilities can we speak of if the soldiers have nothing to eat?
Gen. Joseph Aoun could become Lebanon's president in place of his namesake
If the international community can help Lebanon build a capable army, the balance of power inside the country could finally shift away from Hezbollah and its interests.
But obstacles remain. Nabih Berri, the speaker of parliament and leader of the Hezbollah-allied Amal Movement, has recently played a key role as an intermediary between Hezbollah and foreign actors. His vote will determine, among other things, whose candidacy will be promoted to the presidency, and despite foreign pressure, the name of Suleiman Frangieh has not been taken off the table.
Of course, without international aid, there will be no ceasefire and no money to rebuild Lebanon after the war. The U.S. has already made clear its desire to limit Hezbollah's influence, suggesting that Washington will not interfere with Israel's actions in Lebanon until Beirut gets its political house in order.
True, several potential developments remain possible. The latest reporting suggests that Israel and the U.S. are discussing the return of Israeli hostages from Gaza as a condition for a ceasefire in Lebanon. This is a new position for Israel, which in recent months has tried to terminate previous cease-fire agreements in the Gaza Strip.
Meanwhile, Hezbollah's position has also shifted. The group's senior representatives are reportedly prepared for a ceasefire regardless of how the situation in Gaza unfolds. Their current focus appears to be on simply salvaging what is left of Hezbollah.
At present, Israel estimates that about half of Hezbollah's long- and medium-range rockets have been destroyed. Nevertheless, the group continues to shell Israeli territory daily, even if launches into the center of Israel remain few and far between. This could mean that Hezbollah is conserving its increasingly scarce resources. Reports suggest that the Israeli army managed to deal a major blow to the group's ammunition depots in Syria while disrupting the delivery of weapons from Iran to Lebanon through Syrian territory.
Hezbollah's personnel losses are not yet known, and the organization has stopped releasing such information in recent weeks. What is certain is that Hezbollah is in urgent need of replacements for its recently liquidated top and middle commanders, to say nothing of its struggle to find a replacement for Nasrallah. The surviving members of the Majlis al-Shura — the Consultative Assembly, Hezbollah's highest body — cannot convene for fear of an Israeli strike. If the fighting continues, the group's losses will only grow more severe. Still, it is too early to make final assessments on whether it will remain combat-ready.
Syria or Iran?
Despite it all, Hezbollah shows no intention of leaving the Lebanese political scene anytime soon, and its opponents on the domestic front remain fragmented and weak. The group still represents the majority of the Shiite community, although there, too, attitudes toward its grasp may be slipping.
Discontent began to grow after Hezbollah decided to support Bashar al-Assad’s fight to remain in power in the 2010s, resulting in the loss of hundreds of Lebanese fighters in Syria. Many of these found themselves at the front unwillingly, as Hezbollah has periodically staged forcible mobilizations within the Shiite community. Now that the Shiites have once again taken the brunt of a Hezbollah war effort, it will not be easy for the group to recover its previous standing. Much will depend on the integrity of Hezbollah's financial resources and its ability to actively assist its still-loyal constituents in the future.
Other factors will also affect the situation in Lebanon and the region. International mediators have ambitious plans: a ceasefire, a demarcation of the Lebanese-Israeli border, and reforms in Lebanon. But their success depends on the status of Hezbollah at the end of the war, the outcome of the current standoff between Iran and Israel, and the extent to which Tehran proves willing to temper its regional ambitions. The Iranian factor remains a key variable, especially given the pending nature of Israel’s response to the early October attack that saw Tehran launch more than 180 ballistic missiles.
Much also depends on the assurances that will be given to Israel regarding Hezbollah’s capacity to regroup. Israel will hardly be able to rely on the Lebanese army to prevent Hezbollah from rebuilding its military infrastructure and arsenal along the border. After all, opponents of the Shiite terrorist organization do not automatically become allies of Israel. Even those Lebanese who blame Hezbollah for dragging Lebanon into another war, causing devastation and thousands of deaths, also consider the Israelis responsible for a host of war crimes.
Most importantly, the future of Lebanon is in the hands of the Lebanese people themselves, many of whom are not happy about being put in danger yet again by Hezbollah’s actions. Added to this are old scores: turning Lebanon into a puppet of Syria and Iran, the series of political assassinations, the suppression of the 2019 protests, responsibility for the Beirut port bombing, and obstruction of the investigation into who ought to be held responsible.
And yet, questions remain about the capacity of any political force in Lebanon to stand up to Hezbollah without simultaneously dragging the country into a new civil war. The ruling elites have not changed for decades, and contemporary politicians still represent the same clans that existed before the Civil War. The balance of power can still be shifted, but not without the help of external forces. A combination of Western and Arab countries is actively working — often at cross purposes — to ensure that this balance does not come out in favor of Hezbollah and Iran. Many experts do not rule out a Syrian comeback, especially if Damascus becomes less dependent on Tehran and intensifies contacts with Saudi Arabia. The future of Lebanon and Hezbollah will largely be determined by the evolution of relations between Riyadh and Tehran — along with the Middle East strategy of whoever is elected as U.S. president in November.