A larger regional war is looming over the Middle East.
Israel says that it is initiating ground operations in southern Lebanon. Meanwhile, Iran is in an extremely dangerous position. By creating, arming, and funding Hezbollah, it was able to extend its influence in a vast arc from Lebanon to Syria and Iraq.
The fear of Hezbollah, which had fought the Israelis tenaciously in southern Lebanon, had acted as a deterrent of sorts against an Israeli attack on Iran.
With Hezbollah in disarray, the Israelis may be feeling encouraged to strike Iran, targeting its nuclear facilities, which they have been threatening to do for decades. Iran is said to be very close to making a nuclear weapon and the Israelis may well see this as an opportunity too good to miss.
On the other hand, without its Hezbollah shield, Tehran may feel that it has no option but to attack Israel if it has to maintain any kind of credibility as a regional power. But the Iranians should not forget that on 13 April when they launched a massive drone and missile attack on Israel, it was largely intercepted by the latter with the help of the United States and other Western powers.
The principal lesson for Tehran was that it has far less capacity to harm Israel by itself. Reports suggest that the Iranian leadership is quite shaken, hence the precaution of removing Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei to a safe location after news of Hezbollah Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah's assassination came through.
In the wake of the assassination, Prime Minister Netanyahu claimed that the situation provided an opportunity to Israel for “changing the balance of power in the region for years.” This is an obvious hint that the Israeli campaign against the Axis of Resistance is not about to halt, and will probably find a new target in Iran.
The United States, which initially called for a 21-day ceasefire in the Israel-Hezbollah confrontation, has now lined up behind the Israelis. While it says that it is against an escalation of the war in the Middle East, an Iran-Israel conflict would drag the US into the war, even though Washington should not forget the fiasco of its interventions in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The responsibility for expanding the war on Hamas to all of the Middle East rests firmly with the Israelis. For the past year, Hezbollah had been lobbing rockets into Israel, and most were blocked.
Indeed, there is a good case to argue, that besides token attacks, Hezbollah was deliberately restraining itself to not provide Israel with an excuse to attack Lebanon. But, afraid of a Hezbollah raid into northern Israel, the Israelis had ordered the evacuation of some 60,000 people from the area.
Having more or less subdued Hamas, the Israelis have now decided to escalate hostilities in Lebanon with the pretext of ensuring the security of their northern areas. Netanyahu knows he will remain in power as long as the war goes on, and his goal is to continue the war as long as possible.
As for his government, right-wing elements have messianic ideas about the expansion of Israel to include the entire occupied West Bank as part of Israel. The problem is that the fate of the region now is in the hands of hardliners in Israel and Iran who see it as a struggle for their political survival, rather than the interests of their respective nations.
The last ten days have taken away the global focus from Gaza where the war continues. The global community continues to view Israeli actions critically because of the massive civilian casualties. Israel stands accused of genocide in hearings at the International Court of Justice.
These ten days have restored the reputation of Israeli intelligence (after the 7 October failure) whose 17-18 September pager attacks were seen as a coup of sorts. This has been followed by a number of pinpoint strikes eliminating Hezbollah leaders, including its chief.
But there remain hazards and uncertainties. Hezbollah may be decapitated, but it still retains substantial military capacity. The big issue before Israel, besides the issue of Iran, is whether they should once again embark on a ground campaign in Lebanon to destroy Hezbollah.
As of now, Israel says it is embarking on a limited ground attack which involves shallow raids into northern Lebanon. But given the war-like situation, there is always a danger of this turning into a larger campaign.
Given Israel’s past experience during the 1982-2000 period and then again in 2006, any ground invasion, accompanied by massive death and destruction, will hardly do good for Israel’s image. The problem is that Israeli decisions are determined by its internal politics and Tel Aviv seems to be immune from external pressure.
There is little doubt that the Israeli campaign has decapitated the Hezbollah leadership and left it confused and directionless. This could virtually lead to a situation where the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) steps in to support it.
The recent attacks and assassinations could also lead to a new generation of younger and more extreme Hezbollah leaders who will not exercise the guile and caution that Nasrallah’s generation provided. The IRGC will try to influence the new generation of the organisation to the extent it can.
Hezbollah and Hamas are both severely damaged and their capacities degraded. Before embarking on other ventures, Israel needs to think hard about its ongoing Gaza campaign and how it will be managed after the war is over.
Israel probably has no illusions that its actions can assure permanent peace on its borders because that can only happen if there is a two-state solution to the Palestinian issue. But that eventuality looks remote.
(The writer is a Distinguished Fellow, Observer Research Foundation, New Delhi. This is an opinion article and the views expressed above are the author’s own. The Quint neither endorses nor is responsible for them.)
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