Israel Matzav: The Hezbullah card

The Hezbullah card

Things are heating up on Israel's northern border.

Lebanon's quisling government has asked the United States to restrain Israel from bombing their country back to the 8th century. For once, the Obama administration did the right thing.

US Secretary of State Hilary Clinton sent a message to Beirut that Washington cannot prevent an Israeli strike in Lebanon as long as arms smuggling to Hezbollah continues.

London-based al-Hayat newspaper reported on Monday that the message was conveyed via US Ambassador to Lebanon Michele Sison to Lebanese Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri.

Meanwhile, Hezbullah's patron, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, has been heating up his rhetoric against Israel (Hat Tip: Jihad Watch).

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on Sunday that existence of the Zionist regime is an insult to the entire humanity.

Addressing International Conference on 'National and Islamic Solidarity for Future of Palestine', he said that it is well-known for all that the Zionist regime's mission is threat, violence and beating drums of war.

Supporters of the Zionist regime who are shouting slogans of human rights and anti-terrorism, support systematic crimes of the occupying regime, the president said.

He said that everybody knows that the regime is seeking hegemony over the world.

He said that the Zionist regime is the origin of all the wars, genocide, terrors and crimes against humanity and that they are the racist group not respecting the human principles....

One way Ahmadinejad is likely to try to distract attention from his nuclear weapons pursuit is to heat up Israel's northern border. That's likely what last Thursday's meeting in Damascus was about. The tool to heat up the border will be Hassan Nasrallah and his Hezbullah organization. How free is Ahmadinejad to use that tool? Jonathan Spyer explains that it's a card that Ahmadinejad is only likely to get one chance to play.

Some analysis has suggested that the heightened rhetoric may presage an attempt by Iran to heat up the northern front in response to the hardening international stance to Iran’s nuclear program.

While nothing should be ruled out, a number of factors should be borne in mind in this regard. Hizbullah and its backers are well aware of the broad contours of Israel’s likely response in the event of further aggression by the movement on the northern border. The message has been adequately transferred that a future conflict would not remain within the parameters of a localized Hizbullah clash in southern Lebanon.

Rather, with the organization present in the Lebanese government, and with its decisions regarding war not subject to supervision or appeal by any other element in Lebanon, a future fight is likely to take on the characteristics of a state-to-state conflict.

The results of such a conflict would not doubt be damaging to northern Israel, but to Lebanon and to Hizbullah, they are likely to be devastating. This means that from the Iranian point of view, the Hizbullah card is one of the most valuable that Teheran holds – but it can probably be played only once.

So there is reason to suppose that the Iranians have good reason to hold back on pushing Hizbullah into a fight until a possible later stage – most likely, in response to a future western or Israeli strike on Iranian nuclear facilities.

Spyer goes on to explain why Hezbullah may initiate an attack on Israel - due to its true belief in jihad and its overconfidence in its ability to be victorious. In that case, the Hezbullah card may not be Iran's to play at all. Read the whole thing.

There's another possibility that Spyer doesn't discuss that merits consideration and that's the possibility that Israel may pre-emptively strike at Lebanon. This could happen under one of two scenarios: either that Israel decides to take care of Hezbullah before it feels it has to strike Iran's nuclear capability, or that Israel decides that Hezbullah's rocket supply is getting too big to ignore. I don't believe the second scenario is likely because if that were the case, I believe it would have happened already. But it's entirely conceivable that Israel would pre-emptively strike Hezbullah to remove that threat before it has to go after Iran. In that case, Israel would be looking for at least a month of lead time before Iran's nuclear capability is scheduled to go on line. The delayed international effort to stop Iran is bringing the day that Israel may have to take matters into its own hands much closer. When it comes to its own survival, Israel will not defer to the international community. The nearly wall-to-wall support for Operation Cast Lead a year ago (91% of the Jewish population) proves that.

Ahmadinejad may never have a chance to play the Hezbullah card.

Israel Matzav: The Hezbullah card