As a ceasefire nears, the key question to ask is: What was accomplished in two months of fighting inside Lebanon?
Operation Northern Arrows was launched on September 23, and ground forces crossed the border on October 1. Fighting has mostly occurred near the border, and the goal was to return the 60,000 evacuees to their homes along the border, having evacuated on October 7, 2023.
There were other goals as well, though, one of which was to force Hezbollah to cut its connection to Hamas in Gaza. Hezbollah joined the war on October 8 at the behest of Iran, which sees both Hezbollah and Hamas as its pawns. Over the last decades, it has empowered and armed these groups, and once they were powerful enough, it tried to push them into an existential war with Israel.
October 7 was the first shot in a longer Iranian war on Israel that moved Iran from a cold war to a hot one by including the Houthis and militias in Iraq and Syria.
Defeating Hezbollah in Lebanon – or at least weakening it – may mean forcing it to stop attacking Israel and effectively cutting it off, at least temporarily, from Hamas. Hezbollah has said, though, that a new equation now exists after October 7, in which it assumed the “right” to attack Israel; it will want to rekindle that equation.
Another thing Hezbollah wants to do is act as a deterrent to any strike on Iran; weakening the Hezbollah arsenal may have reduced its capability as a counter-weight.
Hezbollah’s growing strength
However, Hezbollah’s ties to Hamas, as a second front, plus its ability to dictate terms regarding strikes on Iran, are new aspects of Hezbollah’s growing strength. In essence, Israel was trying to get back to square one with Hezbollah by attacking it more intensely in September rather than waging a war of attrition – which was in Hezbollah’s interests.
So now, the story of Hezbollah and Hamas looks increasingly like the parable about a poor man, a rabbi, and a goat. This story, which has different variations, includes a poor man who lives with his kids and wife in a house so small that he is miserable and goes to the local rabbi for advice.
The rabbi suggests he bring a goat into the house, and the man follows suit, crowding his house even more. So, he goes back to the rabbi to complain. The rabbi suggests removing the goat, which makes the house feel larger again. Nothing has changed for the man, but removing the goat changed his perspective on his space.
Israel has removed the “goat” – direct Hezbollah threats along the border – and perhaps keeping Hezbollah from tying the northern front to Gaza. However, this merely puts Israel back on October 6, 2023. It doesn’t turn the clock back to 2006 or other times when Hezbollah had 10% of the rockets it had on October 6.
The fact is that Hezbollah became far too strong, making itself into a monster that could dictate strategy to Israel. Weakening it is good, but victory cannot be bringing things back to square one.
Victory means going further; removing the Hezbollah goat is only one part of the process.