The Lebanese Hezbollah is under serious and escalating pressure. Inside Lebanon, the crisis is one of political legitimacy. Abroad, the crisis is one of sustaining pressure from the United States, Israel, and increasingly, European nations.
Let’s start with the foreign factor.
Addressing the United Nations General Assembly on Tuesday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu identified a Hezbollah missile factory and storage depot in the heart of Beirut. Referencing the August explosion of an ammonium nitrate factory in Beirut, Netanyahu sought to address the city’s residents directly. Producing satellite photos, Netanyahu said, “I want to show you the entrance to Hezbollah’s missile factory. Because that’s what it is. It’s right here. This is the gas company, and this is the missile explosive depot. I say to the people of Janah, you’ve got to act now. You’ve got to protest this. Because if this thing explodes, it’s another tragedy. I say to the people of Lebanon, Israel means you no harm. But Iran does. Iran and Hezbollah have deliberately put you and your families in grave danger. And what you should make clear is that what they have done is unacceptable. You should tell them, tear these depots down. Just a few days ago, one of these depots exploded at Ain Qana in south Lebanon.”
Netanyahu likes to employ these intelligence assessment props in his U.N. speeches. But that doesn’t make them any less credible. Hezbollah is known to store arms in heavily populated areas for just the reasons Netanyahu outlined — namely, that the terrorist group believes it can deter Israeli military action targeting its arms by making the price of any action that of significant collateral civilian casualties.
Hassan Nasrallah denied the accusation. After a few hours of delay, Hezbollah’s leader then allowed journalists to tour the facility in question. While nothing was found, I am highly confident that the arms were either being stored at the facility recently or had been removed just prior to the journalists’ arrival. The Israeli Mossad intelligence service has a very significant operational presence in Beirut and runs agents across Hezbollah’s ranks. It would not mistake a civilian factory for an arms depot. Still, Netanyahu’s declaration represents only the open side of what is a much broader Israeli and Western intelligence campaign to mitigate Hezbollah’s threat. Like an iceberg, most of this activity takes place out of sight. But it centers on aggressive CIA and Israeli efforts to disrupt Hezbollah operations, create frictions within Hezbollah’s ranks, and deny the group its funding streams. Recent European efforts to clamp down on the group’s European fundraising have also paid dividends here. The result is Nasrallah’s significantly reduced freedom of action.
Hezbollah faces another problem: one of domestic political legitimacy.
Responsible for last weekend’s latest failure to form a new Lebanese government, Hezbollah’s penchant for putting its own sectarian interests before those of the Lebanese people is increasingly obvious. Denying condemnations from President Emmanuel Macron of France that it is most responsible for the political inertia and risk of a second civil war, Nasrallah on Tuesday claimed that he “did not set any conditions” against establishing a new government.
This is a simple lie. Determined that their crony control over government ministries should not be transferred to technocratic ministers, Hezbollah is blocking the establishment of a new government. The challenge for Hezbollah, however, is that its obstinacy is creating problems for its allies. The group’s primary Christian political ally, President Michel Aoun, is under increasing pressure for his refusal to make Hezbollah offer concessions. Over time, Hezbollah is losing both legitimacy and, most concerning for its interests, the narrative that its militia forces are critical for Lebanese national security.
In short, Hezbollah risks soon finding itself with fewer friends and far fewer means to serve its foreign policy interests.
