As Israeli advances toward Gaza continue, they appear – for the first time – to come from more than one direction. It is not yet clear whether these are still reconnaissance in force or whether Israel has chosen to make the ground invasion a “rolling operation,” gradually increasing force levels over time.
For the Israeli military, such a cautious approach could prove more practical than an all-out offensive. If tactics are adapted daily to the situation on the ground, successful ones can be replicated elsewhere. From a political point of view, this gives the generals time to see how Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s position develops.
In past conflicts, most Israelis stuck together, avoiding questioning their government too much. Today, many accuse Netanyahu of being responsible for the October 7 attacks. He categorically retorted that “it is time for war.”
But while he was almost certainly referring to the southern Israeli front in Gaza, his intransigence could lead to the opening of another front, to the north.
On Monday, I suggested that countries in the region did not want to join. However, states are not the only entities with armies. In Lebanon, Israel’s northern neighbor, one of these non-state armies, Hezbollah, is stronger than the national army. And not under the control of the central government.
Hezbollah, meaning Party of God, was created in the 1980s during Lebanon’s civil war to unite various factions of the Shiite Muslim minority and provide social services as the state disintegrated. Encouraged by its early successes and by support from Iran, Hezbollah developed an armed wing that quickly became a formidable fighting force.
So formidable that it can be said to be the only Arab force to ever defeat Israel in combat. In 2000, Hezbollah resistance forced Israel to end its occupation of southern Lebanon.
The Israelis angrily refuse to call their withdrawal after a 15-year stay a defeat, but they admit that Hezbollah was a major factor in their decision. In 2006, during a month-long war with Israel, Hezbollah demonstrated an unprecedented and unexpected degree of sophistication and capability by attacking the Israeli corvette Hanit, then one of the three most modern and most efficient, with a Chinese-built land-sea missile. .
Hassan Nasrallah, general leader of Hezbollah, boasts of having 100,000 fighters under his command. He’s probably exaggerating: Most experts put the number at around 60,000, but sheer numbers are not the militia’s greatest asset.
Its strengths lie in adequate military organization, discipline and dedication which are undoubtedly superior to those of most state armies. He also has an arsenal of weapons well-suited to the small-team, infiltration-capable light infantry tactics he learned while fighting Israel. Due to its enemy’s superior airpower and armor, Hezbollah has neither manned aircraft nor tanks, although it operated a battalion-sized armored unit during the war in Syria, to gain experience.
But it has a powerful arsenal of missiles and rockets, heavier and longer range than those used by Hamas, as well as efficient field artillery. Most of the weapons are believed to have been initially supplied by and through Iran. They were complemented in scope and number in the war in Syria, where Hezbollah aided President Bashar al-Assad’s official Syrian forces.
The dedication and determination of Hezbollah fighters resisting Israeli attacks in Beirut in 2006 led Israel to formulate the much-criticized “Dahya Doctrine” of total aerial destruction, which we now witness every day in Gaza. It owes its name to the district of Beirut which experienced this fate for the first time. Israeli General Gadi Eisenkot explained it as a plan to harm civilians as the only way to stop the fighters, using disproportionate power against any civilian structure they might use. This failed to stop Hezbollah.
As an enemy it knows and respects, Hezbollah has forced Israel to deploy massive reinforcements to the Lebanese border, increasing the resident Golani Brigade to likely 100,000 troops or more. He knows that, unlike Hamas – which can only launch rockets – Hezbollah has a realistic possibility of advancing into Israel and holding onto the ground it has won.
But Hezbollah does not need to attack beyond the Blue Line demarcating the two countries. By its very existence, it constitutes what the military calls an “army in waiting”. Israel must retain its assets in the north to counter and deter any potential significant surge that would pose a serious military, and even greater political, problem for Israel.
The current situation and most possible developments seem to favor Hezbollah. If it simply maintains the current low-level engagement, it blocks significant Israeli military assets.
It may choose to respond to the continued destruction of Gaza by launching a relatively moderate series of rocket attacks against Israel without significant risk of provoking an Israeli offensive in Lebanon. Coordinated missile attacks against targets that Hamas can reach, such as Tel Aviv, would strain Iron Dome defenses. And Hezbollah could also bomb northern cities safe for Hamas, such as Haifa or Kiryat Shmona.
Such modest levels of escalation would gain Hamas popularity in the Arab and Muslim world as the only non-Palestinian force to join the fight of the Palestinians in Gaza.
However, all this is only valid if events on the ground follow a certain logic. But rational behavior is fragile and of limited use in situations governed by fear, frustrations, hatred or other strong collective emotions.
The current very low intensity, tense but stable confrontation on Israel’s northern border seems to be the most convenient situation for both sides, and they both know it. But both must worry about the possibility that a small, unpredictable lightning bolt will start a large fire that neither side can contain.
