Tag: Lebanon
It’s about Iran as well as the Palestinians
Israel is now conducting a different war in Lebanon than the one it has conducted in Gaza. As Ahmed Fouad Alkhatib (@afalkhatib) has noted, “Gaza is a war of revenge, not precision.” So far, the war in Lebanon has been far more precise and targeted, though of course it has also killed hundreds of innocent civilians.
The “precision” war
This is likely to continue. The Israelis know most Sunnis, Christians, and Druze in Lebanon do not trust Shia Hezbollah. There is no point in hitting them. Support for President Assad’s war against the (mainly Sunni) Syrian opposition and involvement in Lebanon’s corrupt sectarian politics have blotted Hezbollah’s copybook. Leveling communities that don’t like Hezbollah would make no sense.
Hezbollah opposes the existence of Israel, but it has done little for the approximately 200,000 Palestinians who live in Lebanon. The Israelis are letting it be known that they are contemplating a ground invasion, but that is likely to be unrewarding. The Israel Defense Force will prefer to continue to destroy Hezbollah large rocket and missile inventory from the air. Any ground incursion is likely to be limited to the south.
The Arab openness
The Jordanian Foreign Minister yesterday made the Arab and Muslim position clear:
This is not new for the Jordanians, who protect Israel’s security every day, in return for Israeli help with internal security. But “all of us are willing to right now guarantee the security of Israel” is a bold formula, even with the traditional conditions that follow. He was apparently speaking after a meeting of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation, whose 57 members include the non-Arab Muslim states.
There is more Muslim and Arab acceptance today of Israel’s existence than at any other time since 1948. But Israel isn’t paying any attention. Why not?
Two reasons
The first reason is the one Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi cites. Netanyahu wants to prevent the formation of a Palestinian state. He has devoted the last 30 years to that cause. He is not going to give it up now.
Just as important: for him, the fight with Hamas and Hezbollah is about Iran, not only Palestine. The IDF is well on its way to destroying Tehran’s best deterrent, which was Lebanese Hezbollah’s stock of rockets and missiles. Tehran’s Syrian deterrent is already in tatters. Hamas isn’t destroyed but will need time to recover. So Netanyahu is clearing the way for an Israeli attack on Iran, focused on its nuclear facilities. I find it hard to understand how Iran would use a nuclear weapon against a place as small as Israel without killing a lot of Muslims. But Israeli prime ministers have been willing to do some frightening things to prevent neighbors from getting nukes.
The consequences
With its deterrent gone and at risk of losing its nuclear assets, Tehran will likely amp up its nuclear program. The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps will no doubt see production of nuclear weapons as a necessary deterrent against an Israeli attack. An Iranian sprint for nuclear weapons will ignite Turkiye and Saudi Arabia rivalry. That would make four nuclear or near nuclear powers in the Middle East, with many complicated relations among them. It is hard to see how that will serve Israeli or American interests.
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Not only wider, but higher
Israel yesterday bombed Hezbollah headquarters in Dahiyeh, south of Beirut’s center, and killed its leader, Hassan Nasrallah. Israelis are celebrating:
So are anti-Assad Syrians in Idlib:
Decapitation ups the ante
This Israeli move signals that Prime Minister Netanyahu wants not only to widen the war from Gaza to Lebanon but also wants to up the ante. The assassination of an enemy leader forecloses negotiations and makes it harder to manage the conflict. Israel’s successful cell phone/walkie-talkie attack less than two weeks ago had already infuriated and discombobulated Hezbollah’s militants. The loss of its leader of more than three decades will cause further confusion and distrust in their ranks.
The impact of decapitation on insurgencies is a subject of debate. There is evidence that decapitation can shorten anti-terrorist campaigns, increase the odds of insurgent defeat, and decrease conflict intensity. Others think decapitation has greater chances of success in countering insurgency “when conducted by local forces against a centralized opponent in conjunction with larger counterinsurgency operations.” Those conditions were not fulfilled in yesterday’s raid. Local forces did not conduct it, Hezbollah is a networked opponent, and there was no “larger” counterinsurgency operation.
That said, Hezbollah will need time to regroup. The Israelis likely also killed some of Nasrallah’s lieutenants. A leadership strike of this sort requires inside intelligence. Somehow Israel knew where the Hezbollah leaders were at a specific time. Hezbollah depends a great deal on personal trust among its adherents. The choice of a new leader and the search for a culprit will disrupt that network for some time to come. That may not prevent retaliation in the form of rocket attacks, but those have been militarily ineffective.
Mixed reaction in Lebanon and the Arab world
Lebanese will have a mixed reaction: horror at the civilian lives lost in buildings in the capital, but also some Schadenfreude. Hezbollah has lost its heroic mettle for many Lebanese, both because it went to war against the Syrian opposition and because it is now part of a corrupt, self-perpetuating elite in Lebanon that has delivered little in recent years to its citizens. Even before the Beirut port explosion in 2020, the Lebanese economy’s wheels were coming off. The Lebanese pound has lost well over 90% of its value. Most of the population is impoverished, frustrated, and desperate.
The
The Arab world will likewise have a mixed reaction. Most Arab elites are allergic to Islamist movements like Hamas and Hezbollah. Before today’s event, they were protesting mistreatment of Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank but doing little about it and nothing to defend Hamas and Hezbollah, which are Iranian allies. However, most Arab streets are sympathetic to the Palestinians and want the Gaza war to end (as do most Israelis). That was Hezbollah’s declared aim. It was rocketing Israel since October 8 of last year, it said, to get Israel to end the Gaza war.
It will be interesting to see now whether the Arab street gets agitated enough to change the Arab world’s relative quiescence (relative, that is, to its past military attacks on Israel). The Syrian exception (see video above) is due to Hezbollah’s fighting the opposition on behalf of President Assad.
The West won’t cry crocodile tears but needs to worry
The West won’t mourn Nasrallah, but many in Europe and the US will worry that his death will incentivize a major Hezbollah retaliation. While its rockets have so far caused little strategic damage in Israel, the Israelis would likely respond with further escalation. That will heighten the hostilities. Neither the US nor Europe wants a the wider war heightened.
The West will also need to worry about Hezbollah operations beyond Israel. Hezbollah has terrorist cells in many countries, including the US, which presumably supplied the large bombs that leveled Hezbollah headquarters. US embassies and government offices in Washington could become targets.
Iran is in a bind
Tehran has been trying to avoid war with Israel, which has demonstrated it could bomb Iran’s nuclear sites. Now two of its key allies have suffered a great deal of damage. Israel has not destroyed Hamas, but Iran needs to be concerned how long it will take for Hamas to regain its former military strength. Now Israel has decapitated Lebanese Hezbollah, killed other leaders, and injured thousands of its militants in addition to destroying a significant percentage of the rockets and missiles Iran has supplied.
Asking Tehran to continue to show restraint may be asking too much. Advocates of Iran’s nuclear program in Tehran will be emboldened. They will argue that Israel is looking for war with Iran and that only acquiring nuclear weapons will prevent an Israeli attack. That in turn could create incentives for Turkey and Saudi Arabia to get nukes. Their leaders have both said they will match Iran’s nuclear capabilities. The Middle East with four nuclear weapons states will not be a safe place.
There is another way out. Tehran could tell Hezbollah to withdraw north of the Litani River, as required by the UN Security Council, and end the rocket attacks. This would enable Israelis to return to their homes along the border with Lebanon. It would also give the US leverage in pressing Israel for a ceasefire and prisoner/hostage exchange in Gaza. The war there would be unlikely to end entirely, as Netanyahu needs the war to continue until he can declare unequivocal victory. But relative calm could allow far more humanitarian aid and early reconstruction assistance to flow.
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Israel has chosen the wider war
Israeli warplanes are today striking more than a thousand targets in Lebanon. This ratcheting up of the conflict comes after Lebanese Hizbollah had launched hundreds of rockets in recent days against Israeli targets, including near Haifa and settlements in the West Bank.
There is always something the enemy did yesterday to justify what you are doing today. Israel is driving the escalation to pre-empt what it expects would be a major Hizbollah missile attack in response to the cell phone and pager explosions that last week killed and maimed thousands of its militants. Lebanese view the warnings to civilians as an effort to get them to flee.
The prospects are grim
Hizbollah has ample reason to try to duck the escalation. It is losing a lot of rockets to Israeli attacks. The President of Iran, Hizbollah’s sponsor, has indicated a willingness to de-escalate. Many non-Hizbollah Lebanese–while resenting Hizbollah–are not pleased with suffering the brunt of the Israeli attacks.* The air attacks have killed about 500 today alone. Many thousands of civilians are fleeing. But there is no sign that Hizbollah is willing to comply with Israeli demands that it move away from the border to north of the Litani River or stop the rocket attacks.
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) have reportedly not yet deployed sufficient ground forces for an invasion. The 2006 Israeli invasion of Lebanon did not go well. Israel will try to avoid a repeat. Its stated objective is to enable Israelis who have had to evacuate from near the northern border to return to their homes. A ground invasion would not serve that objective well, but it is still a possibility.
The regional situation
Israel is now at war with Hamas in Gaza, with the Houthis in Yemen, with Hizbollah in Lebanon, and with Syria, which actively supports Hizbollah. Military experts would not have advised opening a multi-front war.
But this serves Prime Minister Netanyahu’s political interests. So long as the country is at war, he can avoid an election. He is hoping that military success will erase resentment of his many defects and enable him to stay in power. Israelis have not forgotten the October 7 intelligence failure, his corrupt practices, or his extremist coalition partners. But so far postponement has worked, even if it is hard to see how it can work forever.
That said, the Arab countries of the region and Turkey object strongly to what Israel has done in Gaza. They will also protest what they are doing in Lebanon. The sympathies of the Arab and Turkish streets remain with the Palestinians. But the governing elites are happy to see Hamas and Hizbollah get their comeuppance. Both are Islamist movements, albeit one Sunna and the other Shia, that serve Iranian interests and are not welcome in most states in the region.
Implications for the US
The wider war means no negotiated end to the war in Gaza before the US election. This is fine with Netanyahu, who supports Trump’s re-election despite President Biden’s full-throated support for Israel.
Trump hasn’t been outspoken on the Middle East. That is because he would lose Arab American votes in Michigan and Wisconsin if he said he wants Israel to win and win quickly and big. But that is precisely what his Netanyahu-aligned advisors and supporters want. He would avoid the handwringing about civilian casualties Biden has evinced or the appreciation for Palestinian rights that Vice President Kamala Harris has voiced.
American restraint on Israel isn’t happening before the November 5 election. Netanyahu knows that. Expect him to use the next six weeks to continue to do as much damage as he can to Hamas and Hizbollah, no matter the harm to Arab civilians.
*Apologies: this sentence did not say what I meant in the original posting.
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Assassinations could mean war with Iran
Israel killed Fuad Shukr, military deputy to Hizbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, in Beirut yesterday with a targeted air strike. Though they have not confirmed their involvement, the Israelis apparently also killed Ismail Haniyeh, political leader of Hamas in Tehran today, likely also with an air strike. There is I suppose some possibility that this was not their doing, but rather an Iranian maneuver due to displeasure with his leadership of Hamas, but that is 100% speculation.
The ultimate impact of these two assassinations, if such they be, is uncertain. Sometimes decapitation works. Sometimes it doesn’t. But the success of both operations tells us a good deal about Lebanon, Iran, and Israel.
Lebanon and Iran have weak air defenses
That Lebanon has ineffective air defenses is not surprising. The country has been on the ropes at least since the Beirut port explosion in 2020, but even before that its army could not match the Israelis on the ground or in the air. Lebanese Hizbollah is the main threat to Israel from the north. Its air defenses are improving. But the killing of Shukr demonstrates that Israel has the intelligence capability to track Hizbollah leadership and the precision strike capability to hit a single building in crowded southern Beirut without apparently activating either Lebanon’s or Hizbollah’s air defense.
The same is true, and even more impressive, for Iran, if in fact the Israelis did it. Haniyeh was killed in a residence facility of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). The Israelis would have had to track him there, evade Iranian air defenses, and strike accurately at a distance of almost 1000 miles from Jerusalem. Iranian inability to prevent this in the aftermath of the presidential inauguration yesterday suggests weak air defenses. Or a special forces unit might have penetrated on the ground.
Israel wants war with Iran
The Israeli willingness to undertake these two assassinations, if in fact Haniyeh was their doing, would suggest that Prime Minister Netanyahu is prepared to risk escalation of the already simmering regional conflict. The two assassinations may well provoke another direct attack from Iran, which tried and failed in April to punish Israel for an earlier Beirut assassination. Escalation this time could be rapid.
There is no question that Tehran backs Hamas, Hizbollah, and the Yemeni Houthis. This is the much-vaunted “axis of resistance,” whose leaders were in Tehran for the inauguration of a new president. Netanyahu earlier this month in his speech in Congress blamed Iran bluntly for their activities. He appears to want a direct confrontation with Tehran, rather than dealing only with its allies.
The Americans do not, but what they can do about it at this point is not clear. Netanyahu sees an opportunity to damage Israel’s enemies while the Arab states stand by. They too want to see Iran diminished. He likely figures the Americans will be pleased if Israel is successful. He appears little concerned with the possibility of failure.
Implications for the US
It will be hard for the US to stay aloof if Netanyahu is successful in provoking Iran into entering the regional war. The Middle East would once again have to take priority. Ukraine and China would have to wait. American military supplies to Israel would be vital.
An Israel/Iran war would likely affect the US presidential race. Kamala Harris would find Democrats divided. The aging leadership in Congress would want to back Israel. But many Democrats, like most Israelis, want Israel to end the war in Gaza by cutting a hostage deal with Hamas. Donald Trump would gain some advantage in the presidential race, even if his running mate has wanted to shift attention from the Middle East to the Pacific. American popular opinion will heavily favor Israel if there is war with Iran.
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Avoiding the slippery slope to the wider war
Hizbollah and Israel are trading tit for tat attacks across the Lebanon-Israel border. The Houthis in Yemen are attacking shipping in the Red Sea. The US and UK have raided Houthi military assets. Shia “popular mobilization forces” (PMFs) are attacking US facilities in Iraq and US forces are occasionally responding. Iran has launched missiles into Iraqi Kurdistan’s capital, Erbil, targeting the house of the US Consul General. Even added altogether it won’t amount to the 1000 deaths required to designate something a “war,” but we are clearly on the slippery slope to the long-feared wider war in the Middle East.
Iran is benefiting
This should not be welcome in the US. Ukraine is already absorbing vast quanitities of US military supplies. Deterring China from attacking Taiwan is stretching not only logistics but also US naval operations. Israel’s war on Gaza is requiring enormous amounts of US and European materiel, without any prospect of improving US security.
But the enemy gets a vote. Iran may not be directing all of what Hizbollah, Hamas, the Houthis, and the Iraqi PMFs are doing. But Tehran has supplied the means and resistance ideology that motivates them all. Iran is hoping to force the US out of the region. So far, that isn’t working. The US has deployed additional naval and other assets to the Middle East.
Meanwhile, Tehran is enriching more uranium and moving closer to nuclear weapons capability. No more than a few weeks would be required for Iran to construct an atomic weapon, assuming its scientists have already done the necessary designs, experimented with the required conventional explosives, and acquired the needed non-fissile material.
My former dean, Eliot Cohen, argues that the way to prevent the wider war is to levy a devastating attack on the Houthis, rather than the well-calculated proportional one the Biden Administration has so far administered. I’m not sure he is wrong, but it will take a more reckless president than Biden to pursue that course. That is something neither Eliot nor I would welcome.
Regaining advantage
The US needs somehow to regain a more advantageous position in order to shape the course of events. The place to start is Gaza. Biden should end the war there by reading the riot act to Prime Minister Netanyahu: no more weapons if the killing of civilians continues at anything like previous pace.
A pause in the large-scale attacks on Gaza would give the Israelis an opportunity to unseat the unpopular Netanyahu and put in his place a government that prioritizes the fate of the hostages, humanitarian conditions inside Gaza, and negotiations with the Palestinians. Such a government would also continue targeted raids on Hamas leadership and militants who participated in the October 7 attack on Israel. But it would end the disproportionate bombing of civilian areas and open Gaza up to both commercial and humanitarian shipment of goods and services.
Such a pause would give diplomats an opportunity to pursue the possibility of an agreement between Lebanon and Israel on outstanding, but relatively minor, border issues, thus depriving Hizbollah of a major rallying cry. It would also relieve pressure on Iraq to evict American bases. As for the Houthis, they have proven resilient. No quick blow is going to make them go away. We are in for a long effort to deprive them of the military capabilitiues they have amassed in recent years.
Good fortune
We should count our blessings. China is in economic trouble and in no position to attack Taiwan anytime soon. The Taiwanese election yesterday of a pro-independence leader will provoke lots of Beijing rhetoric, and many planes crossing the Taiwan Strait median line, but no actual military attack.
Moscow has celebrated the European and American blockage of assistance to Ukraine, but we can hope that is temporary. It is vital that Kyiv get whatever it needs to chase Russian forces from all of Ukrainian territory, including Crimea. That alone would greatly enhance American leverage worldwide.
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Stevenson’s army, January 8
– Why does DNI think Israel will be in trouble if war expands to Lebanon?
– Why does MITRE think US intelligence is deficient in covering China?
– How dramatic is the new Japanese defense posture?
– What’s behind ouster of so many Chinese defense officials?
– Why didn’t we know about SecDef Austin’s hospitalization?
– What’s in the new budget deal?
– Can US keep its base in Niger?
– How bad are new threats linked to Iran?
My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I republish here, with occasional videos of my choice. To get Stevenson’s army by email, send a blank email (no subject or text in the body) to stevensons-army+subscribe@googlegroups.com. You’ll get an email confirming your join request. Click “Join This Group” and follow the instructions to join. Once you have joined, you can adjust your email delivery preferences (if you want every email or a digest of the emails).
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