Hezbollah conflict with Israel escalates as missile strikes from Lebanon bring Israel closer to full-scale war, with hundreds dead and civilian evacuations underway.
Hezbollah front
Israel now fights both on its western and northern borders after the tense stalemate with Hezbollah-the militant organization based in Lebanon-turned into open conflict.
One year of conflict. Supporting Hamas, Hezbollah launched missile strikes against Israel on Oct. 8, a day after Hamas struck Israel.
In response it’s missile attack, Hezbollah and Israel have been at war, bombing for bombing. Yesterday, Israel bombed 1,300 sites in Lebanon. More than 490 people lost their lives.
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Since Israeli troops marched into Gaza to confront Hamas, analysts and officials have been sounding dire warnings that the war might quickly escalate and unfold into a regional bloodletting.
Hamas is part of a wide network of anti-Israel groups that stretches across the Middle East, and it is backed by Iran; that network, of course, includes Hezbollah.
Israeli strikes over the weekend, striking back at Hezbollah’s attacks, bring Israel closer to full-scale war in the region against Iranian proxies.
Key Factors Fueling the Hezbollah Conflict with Israel
What led to the strikes, what is happening now, and what might come next-this newsletter will explain.
Year of escalation.
This is a huge paramilitary group claiming to desire to destroy Israel and roll back U.S. power in the region.
This group, established in the 1980s as Israel fought a war in Lebanon, also wields significant political influence in the country and de facto controls a significant portion of Lebanon.
For much of its four decades, Hezbollah has been bombarding Israel as well as Israel’s allies and other overseas targets, such as a Jewish cultural center in Argentina in 1994.
Hezbollah first made international headlines in 1983, when it bombed the American embassy in Beirut, Lebanon’s capital, and later American and French barracks there.
Since the Oct. 7 attack, the battle between Israel and Hezbollah has escalated:
Hezbollah’s rockets have thrown tens of thousands of civilians in northern Israel out of their homes.
It says it intends to keep its assault going until Israel stops its attacks on Gaza.
Israel has retaliated.
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Last week it bombed pagers and other electronic equipment of Hezbollah members. Those attacks killed at least dozens and wounded thousands more.
Israel has been sustaining Hezbollah stores long-range rockets within people’s homes. Over this weekend, Israel advised Lebanese residents in those areas to leave.
Some human rights groups assailed the warnings as being way too cursory, arguing it would be impossible for Lebanese civilians rationally to know whether they live close to concealed military targets.
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Israel then began bombing targets in Lebanon, that include Beirut, hoping that this will knock out more Hezbollah’s leaders and weaponry.
Israel wants to totally rout Hezbollah, leaving it to backtrack and cease its rocket salvos. Then thousands of Israeli civilians could return home.
It has responded with more rockets and sometimes firing deeper into Israel than before.
Asked about such counterattacks, Israeli officials have begun curtailing gatherings in the northern parts of their country. Schools and businesses in the region were closed again yesterday.
The pattern is old. Both Israel and Hezbollah claim that their attacks are intended to pressure the other into halting a war. Rather, the attacks have been building.
So what’s next
It hasn’t launched a full-scale war with Israel since 2006, when it invaded Lebanon after the kidnapping of Israeli soldiers.
More than 1,000 Lebanese and 150 Israelis were killed. Israel claimed it had won the battle but “the spillover didn’t seem to have much lasting effect on Hezbollah activities.”.
How would Israel do in a full-scale war with Hezbollah today? It has already smitten Hezbollah’s leadership with the recent airstrikes and pager attacks.
But Israel is also fighting in Gaza and the West Bank, where the military has supported Israeli settlers.
If Israel were to launch a ground war in Lebanon, it might be forced to call up tens of thousands of reservists, many of whom are already exhausted by their battles elsewhere.
“On the one hand, it is one of the best-equipped militaries in the world,” my colleague Patrick Kingsley, the Jerusalem bureau chief, told me. “On the other hand, it is stretched thin.”.
Yet Israeli leaders may feel popular support. Surveys last week show that a slim majority of Israelis favor a more pitched battle with Hezbollah.
“The evacuation of hundreds of thousands of Israelis from northern Israel is viewed as a collective abdication of sovereignty,” Patrick said.
And as Hezbollah appears unlikely to reduce its attacks in defense of Hamas, the danger of further intensification remains very real.