Now that the historical leadership of Hezbollah is gone, will the Party go, too?

 

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  by Dr Mustafa Fetouri

   MFetouri

Over the last three months, starting last July, Israel succeeded in targeting the top Hezbollah leadership in Lebanon through a series of well coordinated and targeted assassinations that wiped out the entire organisations’ founding leaders. By 1 October, it managed to kill the Islamic Resistance’s political and military commander, the Secretary-General, Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah.

Starting with the assassination of Hamas’s Saleh Al-Arouri in Beirut last January, it was clear to observers that Israel’s spy agency, the Mossad, has penetrated the internal communications and command structure, particularly the political leadership, of both Palestinian groups and Hezbollah in Lebanon.

The killing of Al-Arouri and almost all subsequent similar operations, mostly drone targeted assassination, the role of human intelligence was crucial in helping the Israelis decide when and how to act. While Israel, backed by the United States, is technologically superior to all its enemies combined, it still benefits from human intelligence because it is the only way to provide real time information, particularly in connection with top leaders like the late Nasrallah, whose whereabouts, movements and sleeping places are the most guarded secrets within Hezbollah.

Now that the man who led Hezbollah for over three decades is gone, the question is would this lead to disarray and the ultimate demise of the armed group that has been Israel’s nightmare for decades?

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Despite what pro-Israeli propaganda says, everything on the ground says otherwise. After Israel launched its ground invasion of southern Lebanon, described by top Israeli leaders as “limited operation” the performance of Hezbollah has been regular and within its historical fighting patterns.

It still fires rockets and ballistic missiles deep inside Israel, while its fighters on the ground still confront Israeli soldiers, engaging them and destroying their equipment, too. This simple observation means the military wing of the group, despite the big losses it has incurred, so far, is still intact and exercising command and control over the frontlines.

We might not know how the political tier of the group will operate in the future and who will, ultimately, become the secretary-general, but that is less critical at the moment, as long as the military structure is busy with fighting the Israeli invaders.

To reassure supporters inside Lebanon and beyond, the acting leader of Hezbollah, Sheikh Naim Kassem, has so far appeared in three separate televised speeches since Nasrallah was killed. In his last speech he said that his group is now focused on “hurting the enemy” through targeting Haifa and even Tel Aviv, while emphasizing that the group’s military capabilities are still intact and still able to hurt Israel.

According to the late Nasrallah himself, in many interviews, decision-making on the issues of leadership and military operations are group made decisions and the Secretary-General does not have a monopoly power over them. This means the internal workings of the Party will decide on who will be the next leader. Whenever that happens, it might remain secret for a while for security reasons.

What is critical here is the internal procedures of the Party and, particularly, that decision-making within the group itself is still intact.

Notably Hezbollah, since it was founded in 1982, has never had any serious internal threats to its existence like, for example, internal fights and quarrels that lead to splits from within. From day one, it was one coherent organisation and, over the years, remained as such while being flexible and dynamic in a changing and challenging political environment, always under military pressure and security threat from Israel. Yet, the group remained intact from within and never faced a serious existential threat from within Lebanon or beyond.

The killing of most of its top leaders, including the charismatic and well-spoken leader, Nasrallah, has certainly been a heavy blow but it is unlikely to lead to its demise.

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Besides, we must also take into account the fact that, politically, Hezbollah is an important political player in Lebanon as it has its own elected officials in the Parliament, participates in the government where it has two ministers, including Finance Minister, Youssef El-Khalil. On top of that, the Party has, over the years, built its own social and entrepreneurial and charity networks within its Shia communities across Lebanon. All this means that the Party, even if it halts its military operations against Israel – which is nearly impossible – will not disappear from the political scene and will always find ways to adapt to the unstable and murky Lebanese politics.

Regionally, the Party is a well-connected ally to Iran, which remains a sworn enemy of Israel and still top supporter of Hezbollah. It is in Tehran’s interest to see the Party it has been helping remains active, both politically and militarily.

Most pro-Israeli commentators have been cheering the death of Hezbollah’s top leaders as the start of the end of the Party itself, but this view only considers the military side of the equation, ignoring the fact that the Party is much more than fighting groups seeking to liberate Lebanese territory occupied by Israel and an important ally of Hamas inside Palestine.

Commenting on the pager and walkie-talkie attacks by Israel which killed and wounded thousands including some Hezbollah members, the late Nasrallah described the hit as a “big test” but it will the Party which will “pass this test with pride and heads held high”.  He also said that such a “big and strong blow did not bring us down”. Now, it appears that his own death failed to disintegrate the Party, let alone discount it in the militarily sense.

Until today, Israel has not been able to achieve its top military goal from its war against Hezbollah, which is securing its north to thousands of settlers who fled the area, starting on 8 October, 2023, when Hezbollah launched its cross-border bombardment. Now the Israeli government wants to push Hezbollah further north and away from its borders. How that will happen is unclear and appears impossible, since Hezbollah relies on missiles and rockets that can hit targets as far away as Tel Aviv, which is nearly 200 kilometres away from the border. As long as missiles and drones can still be launched inside Israel, the idea of returning thousands of Israeli settlers into their homes in the north is a far-fetched idea, similar to wiping out Hamas in Gaza which has been failing, despite a long year of genocide and destruction in Gaza.

https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20241017-now-that-the-historical-leadership-of-hezbollah-is-gone-will-the-party-go-too/