The apparent assassination of Hezbollah leader Sayed Hasan Nasrallah in a massive attack on a clandestine headquarters in Beirut’s southern suburbs marks the most alarming escalation in nearly a year of war between the Shiite militant organization and Israel.
Immediately after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s aggressive speech to the UN General Assembly, in which he directly threatened Iran and promised to continue to “degrade” Hezbollah, the first news of an all-out attack came. started to emerge.
Within an hour, Israeli journalists with ties to the country’s defense and security establishment suggested that Nasrallah was the target and that he was in the headquarters area at the time of the attack. attack.
A series of statements from Israel quickly confirmed that the attack was considered very significant, including an image showing Netanyahu ordering the attack by telephone from his New York hotel room.
What is clearer than ever after a series of Israeli escalations against Hezbollah this month – including targeted assassinations and the explosion of thousands of modified pagers and walkie-talkies supplied to the group – is that basic rules, long understood, which govern the The balance of deterrence between the two sides has been broken.
For much of the early months of the conflict with Hezbollah, which began on October 8 – a day after Hamas attacked from Gaza – it was understood that Israel would not assassinate the militant group’s most senior members. But in recent months, these red lines have become increasingly blurred.
As the geographic scope of both sides’ attacks has expanded into Lebanon and Israel, Israeli operations have targeted an increasing number of senior Hezbollah commanders, beyond those directly involved in launching attacks on the land in southern Lebanon.
In fact, since the start of the year, diplomats and analysts familiar with the region have suggested that one goal of the discreet exchanges between Israel and Hezbollah through US special envoy Amos Hochstein and intermediaries of the group was focused on preserving the understanding. that senior members of the militant group would not be targeted.
However, on the Israeli side, evidence has been mounting over the past 15 days that a significant escalation was brewing.
The country’s security agencies have claimed that Hezbollah had unsuccessfully plotted against senior Israeli officials, and it has also been suggested that the Israeli escalation was aimed at thwarting the militant group’s own plans to launch a major offensive.
All of this, it now seems clear, was the preamble to a multifaceted and long-planned effort to decapitate Hezbollah.
Although it will take several days to understand the full consequences of Friday’s attack, Netanyahu and his military leaders have made a huge gamble, not only with regard to the situation in northern Israel, where tens of thousands people have been displaced by the fighting, but across the region and in the country’s relations with its international partners.
Amid international efforts led by the United States and France to negotiate a three-week ceasefire with Hezbollah, the move is a slap in the face for the Biden administration, which believed Netanyahu had assured it of his support for the temporary truce.
Instead, it appears that Netanyahu and his military leadership have always been secretly preparing the ground for a planned attack aimed at violently underscoring the rhetorical flourishes of the Israeli prime minister’s warnings to Hezbollah and Iran during his little-attended speech Friday at the UN.
More importantly, the attacks represent a direct challenge to Tehran, for whom Nasrallah represented its most important regional strategic ally, and whose tens of thousands of Iranian-supplied missiles aimed at Israel have long been considered a key strategic asset. to prevent an Israeli attack. against Iran itself.
Now all is lost. Despite anonymous Israeli claims – later denied by the IDF – that they destroyed up to 50% of Hezbollah’s missile arsenal, which numbered well over 100,000 missiles, this remains highly unlikely. And although Hezbollah’s command and control has been severely damaged, it is likely to retain significant capabilities.
Other Iranian allies, such as Iraq, Syria and Yemen, have their own missiles and drones which, although less important than those of Hezbollah, could come into play not only against Israel, but also against targets American.
Then the biggest question remains: Can Iran accept an attack on Nasrallah, or whether it could also be drawn into a widening conflict, and whether the attack on the Hezbollah leader shows that Israel is seeking to create the conditions for an attack against Iran.
The Iranian embassy in Beirut condemned the Israeli airstrike, saying it “represents a serious, game-changing escalation” and that Israel will be “punished appropriately.”
