Looking at the multiple angles of the Israel-Hamas War, one conclusion gradually emerges: Hamas has been sacrificed by the Iranian regime, and Hezbollah is fighting merely as an alibi and not for any kind of victory. The behaviour of these two provides support to this thesis. Firstly, Hezbollah: Hassan Nasrallah explained himself on 3 November 2023 in a televised speech: Hamas had not warned him of the date of the “Operation Al-Aqsa Flood”, and therefore, he had needed 24 hours to launch Hezbollah forces into a campaign of shells and drones on Israel (“occupied Palestine”, or the “Zionist entity”, in his ideological terminology). This apparent support is however only partial, so Nasrallah has to justify himself with arguments such as “It is we who choose the moment of our attack; we practise strategic ambiguity”.) It is hardly convincing because strategists believe that Hezbollah’s tunnel system is far more developed than Hamas’s, and the border between Israel and Lebanon is far less defensible by the Israel Defense Forces than that between Israel and Gaza.
Militarily, Hezbollah could, therefore, make inroads into northern Israel, coordinating with Hamas in the south and possibly with Hamas and its allies in the West Bank. On 7 October, the US Navy was not yet massed off the coast of Lebanon. Several times after 8 October, commandos of Palestinians from Lebanon, sponsored by Hezbollah, managed to penetrate the North in small groups, only to be annihilated by the Israeli army and border police. Clearly, the incursions from Lebanon were not massive, and no member of Hezbollah itself was openly involved in any territorial intrusion.
In further support of Nasrallah’s evasiveness, it should be noted that while the Israeli command was, as always, on its guard in the North, on 7 October, a window of opportunity for attack nevertheless opened up for Hezbollah – perhaps the only real opportunity to use its anti-tank missiles. Hezbollah, the only quasi-effective anti-Israeli force, missed its opportunity, if we assume that it ever intended to storm into Galilee.
Another sign of this reluctance to throw all its forces into the battle is that, until late March, Hezbollah has respected the virtual and tacit agreement with Israel not to fire more than 8 km from the border, except in exceptional circumstances. And never to engage Hezbollah militiamen on Israeli soil. The Israeli command respects the same system of aerial counter-strikes and does not advance Israeli troops into Lebanese soil. In one of the extremely rare Israeli surgical strikes, in the south of Beirut, the goal was to liquidate a Hamas commander. There was no collateral damage, and only two floors of a building were blown up by a missile that entered through the window. One wonders in passing why the Israeli air force did not act with its legendary precision elsewhere in Gaza, but that is another question.
If we accept the hypothesis of Hezbollah’s strategic restraint, we must look at the reasons. To decipher them, there are words and deeds: what did Hezbollah, i.e. Nasrallah, say? What did Hamas say? What is the Iranian regime saying?
Nasrallah, never short of marathon explanations from his studio in Beirut, gave the key to his logic on 3 November. He certainly supported his Hamas brothers, but Hamas is autonomous and made its choice on 7 October independently and without informing him. Hezbollah obligingly implemented a military support plan, which was initiated on 8 October. According to Nasrallah, a quarter of the Israeli army was immobilised on the Israel-Lebanon front. So, according to him, Hezbollah is taking part in the struggle.
Of course, these explanations are flawed: the principle of a massive Hamas incursion on Israeli soil could not have been unknown to the Hezbollah command, and the date of 7 October was certainly a propitious moment for symbolic reasons, i.e. the reminder of the Egyptian and Syrian attack of 7 October 1973.
Now that Hezbollah’s partial restraint is fully visible, the Hamas leadership is faced with a dilemma: denounce a Hezbollah semi-betrayal, which would completely divide the camp of the “Resistance” against Israel, or conceal its disappointment so as not to isolate itself symbolically from the anti-Zionist Shia bloc. A Hamas-Hezbollah falling out would be very welcome for Israel and would not bring Hamas out of its Twilight of the Gods.
For Hezbollah, the dilemma is different: faced with the combined strength of the American fleet, the Tsahal, and the Lebanese nationalist Christian and Sunni sectors and even many Shia (Amal, the unenthusiastic Shia ally), Hezbollah does not dare attempt an all-out war. The risk of defeat, or at least a Pyrrhic victory, is too great.
What about Tehran? The Iranian regime also claims to be fighting for the Palestinians, mainly for the symbol of Jerusalem and the Al Aqsa mosque. Gaza, as such, means nothing to the reigning Shia clergy and Revolutionary Guards. But the regime is being challenged from within by a certain modernist civil society at a time when the US Navy and US forces in Syria and Iraq are on maximum alert. In any case, Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian is busy shuttling between Tehran and Beirut, distilling sibylline messages. “We are prepared for all eventualities, but it is not Iran that will cause a regional explosion” is one of his favourites.
Tehran has indeed activated the Houthis in Yemen, who are overexcited by a war that in truth does not concern. They are firing missiles and drones at commercial shipping in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Oman. The ultimate aim of a Houthi intervention would be to tire out the Western navies and lend credence to the idea of a regional war. In this way, on the day of negotiation, Tehran would look like the head of a Shia Muslim anti-Western galaxy, the mini superpower in a way, but without having been obliged to get directly involved in the Israel-Hamas war. It should be remembered that Hamas, an offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood, which is itself in retreat in all the Arab regimes, is dangerously situated between Daesh-Al Qaeda and Iranian political Shiism. Hence, the Hamas-Tehran link is very fragile. Hamas is dispensable because its victory, however improbable, would belong to the Muslim Brothers. In the end, the Shia bloc seems to be merely simulating a war of support for the Palestinians in order to save its reputation as the leader of the “Resistance” once Hamas has been eliminated as a military force.
This is why Tehran can sacrifice Hamas. Was this the original plan? Impossible to say at the moment, but seen from Tehran and Beirut, such a plan would make sense.
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