Five implications from Nasrallah’s assassination

Hassan Nasrallah gave his last public remarks back on September 19, vowing to avenge Israel’s pager attacks via a plan that’d be privy to “only the narrowest circle” of Hezbollah.

But nine days later, as the sun set over Beirut on Friday evening, Israel assassinated the Hezbollah chief and his remaining circle in their underground bunker, using dozens of air-launched munitions in a bunker-busting tactic known as ‘daisy chaining’. It killed not only Nasrallah and ~20 of his lieutenants, but also his adult daughter, an Iranian general, and (at least) dozens more, including in a half dozen residential buildings above ground.

Who was Nasrallah?

After stints studying at Shiite seminaries in Najaf (Iraq) and Qom (Iran), he took the reins of Hezbollah when an Israeli gunship assassinated his predecessor back in 1992. Nasrallah then went on to transform the listed terrorist group, including its:

• Tactics (towards more of a guerrilla approach)
• Politics (to become a dominant player in Lebanon)
• Optics (providing social services like health and education), and all fuelled by
• Finances (sitting atop a vast illicit economy plus Iranian largesse).

Along the way, many lionised Nasrallah for ousting Israel from Lebanon in 2000 and 2006. But Hezbollah also helped assassinate Lebanon’s PM in 2005, crushed reformist voices, blocked a probe into the catastrophic 2020 Beirut explosion, and helped prop up neighbouring Syrian dictator al-Assad, resulting in the deaths of a half million Syrians.

And maybe that helps explain the mixed reactions to Nasrallah’s death: many Shia voices are mourning across Iraq, Iran, and parts of Lebanon. But opposition-held towns in Syria are openly celebrating his demise, while Lebanon’s 17 other religious sects, with varying experiences of Hezbollah’s domination, have still mostly hunkered down for now, wary of more sectarian strife.

Arguably the most interesting reactions have been elsewhere, with players like Egypt, Jordan, the Saudis and others all relatively muted. That likely reflects their own balancing act, with populations that largely echo Hezbollah’s voiced solidarity with the Palestinian people, but with rulers who see Hezbollah as a tool to boost Iran’s own regional clout.

And that brings us to what Nasrallah’s assassination means.

1. Israel is again facing criticism over its use of so much firepower in a residential area. And its own US allies will be embarrassed that, just as they were calling for a ceasefire, with Bibi himself in New York, Israel instead used US arms to escalate.
2. Hezbollah now looks like a paper tiger – it thought it could contain things to a carefully calibrated tit-for-tat, preserving its own cred without escalating too far, but it’s now lost virtually its entire leadership and much of its arsenal in nine days.
3. That risks tipping the balance across Lebanon, where the intimidation Hezbollah has long used to dominate rival factions has just been denuded – the result could be an easing of the group’s stranglehold, and/or more sectarian bloodshed.
4. It also risks tipping the balance in neighbouring Syria, where to the extent Hezbollah (like Assad’s other backer, Russia) continues to refocus its resources back home, it’ll leave Assad more exposed.
5. And this might all tip the balance against Iran, which has now barely lifted a finger as its own proxies like Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houthis, and beyond have all taken hits. It leaves Tehran looking less trustworthy to its allies, less fearsome to its rivals, and less invincible to its own people. And that all leaves less of a deterrent for Israel to, say, take out Iran’s nuclear facilities.

So it’s any wonder why the regime in Tehran has now reportedly spirited its ageing supreme leader away to a secret secure location, if such a place even exists at this point.

INTRIGUE’S TAKE

The other big question is whether or not Bibi now presses onwards with another full ground invasion into Lebanon, to push Hezbollah 15km (9mi) back beyond the Litani River as required by UN Security Council resolution 1701 (2006). There are already reports of Israeli special forces conducting exploratory raids over the border.

• Israel says it wants the ~60,000 Israelis displaced by Hezbollah rocket attacks to return to their homes, and history suggests that’ll be hard to achieve via an air campaign alone, plus Hezbollah is now at its weakest in years, but…
• In addition to the humanitarian costs, sending Israeli troops back into Lebanon would risk tilting things back in favour of Hezbollah, which has spent the better part of the last two decades rigging the whole area with tunnels, weapons, and defences.

Still, with Netanyahu now riding high at home and US support not going anywhere, it’s hard to see him tapping the brakes at this point.

Also worth noting:

• An estimated one million people have now been displaced within Lebanon in the last week, with 100,000 fleeing over the border to Syria.
• Hezbollah has long held the destruction of Israel as a core aim (Nasrallah infamously described the country as a cancer).