Cross-border violence along Israel’s border with Lebanon has spiked since Palestinian militant group Hamas launched a deadly attack on Israel on Oct. 7, raising fears that a new front is developing in the conflict.
Iran-backed Hezbollah, a militant group based in Lebanon, has been exchanging fire with Israeli soldiers across the border during the past week, the deadliest escalation since the 2006 Israel-Hezbollah war.
Israel has evacuated towns near its northern border with Lebanon and says it has killed four Hezbollah militants wearing explosive vests who were attempting to cross into Israel on Tuesday.
Hezbollah says it attacked five locations on Wednesday including an Israeli barracks in Zar’it and a position across the border from Lebanon’s Ras Naqoura area, using guided missiles in several of the strikes.
“The big fear right now, as we speak, is that Hezbollah is either going to intervene in sympathy with Hamas and what’s going on in Gaza or has been using the Palestinian issue, as many experts would argue, in order to advance its own interests and therefore the interests of Iran,” says Arne Kislenko, a professor specializing in security and intelligence studies at the Toronto Metropolitan University and the University of Toronto.
“And this is where the situation could very sadly … escalate dramatically and drag Iran into an even larger conflict.”
Here’s a closer look at the Hezbollah group and its influence in Lebanon and relations with Hamas.
What is Hezbollah?
Hezbollah was founded as a Shiite militant group during Israel’s invasion of Lebanon in 1982, which was done in response to clashes between Israel and Palestinian Liberation Organization forces operating there and came one month after Shlomo Argov, Israel’s ambassador to the United Kingdom, was shot by Palestinian militants in London.
The group was created with Iranian support as a “frontline of Iranian ambitions in the Middle East,” says Kislenko, adding that Hezbollah has received funding and training from Tehran continually since its origin.
A U.S. Congressional Research Service brief about the group describes its stated goals initially as being to drive Israel out of southern Lebanon, which was achieved in 2000, and ongoing conflict with Israel aimed at reducing U.S. influence in the region.
The Canadian government lists the group as a terrorist entity and describes it as “one of the most technically capable terrorist groups in the world.”
“Its goals are the liberation of Jerusalem, the destruction of Israel, and, ultimately, the establishment of a revolutionary Shia Islamic state in Lebanon, modelled after Iran,” the federal government says.
The group entered politics in 1992, participating in its first election. Hezbollah members first held seats in the Lebanese cabinet in 2005, and have held seats in the government ever since.
Over the years, it has built a vast network of schools, health-care facilities, youth programs and other social services in Lebanon, and operates with “relative impunity” in the country, the U.S. Congressional Research Service says.
Hezbollah is currently led by Hassan Nasrallah, who has served as the group’s secretary general since 1992, when Israel assassinated the previous leader.
How powerful is Hezbollah?
Hezbollah is very powerful both politically and militarily, experts say.
The group controls large swathes of Lebanon either directly through elected MPs or through indirect influence, like corruption and sometimes intimidation, Kislenko said.
“They have become a Lebanese political and social force over the last four decades,” he added.
While other groups disarmed after Lebanon’s civil war in 1990, Hezbollah kept its weapons to fight Israeli forces in the predominantly Shiite south of the country.
Among the groups that Iranian Revolutionary Guard has supported, Hezbollah ranks as the “most capable militarily and the most powerful,” Kislenko said. Hezbollah forces are known for their huge array of rockets, advanced techniques and experienced soldiers, he added.
The group fought a war against Israel that lasted five weeks in 2006.
Although Hezbollah is based in Lebanon, it has also operated in other parts of the Middle East.
It has deployed its forces to support the Syrian regime of Bashar al-Assad, with which it has a long-standing relationship, according to the Institute for the Study of War.
In Yemen, it has provided training and weapons to the Houthi rebels
How has Hezbollah responded to the Hamas attack?
Hezbollah has deep ties to Hamas, which controls Gaza, as well as Palestinian Islamic Jihad, another faction linked to Iran.
The group congratulated and praised Hamas on Oct. 7 for carrying out an unprecedented attack from Gaza into Israel, hailing it as a “heroic operation.”
In its statement, Hezbollah also said its command in Lebanon was in direct contact with Hamas about the progress of operations.
However, there is no evidence to suggest that either Iran or Hezbollah was involved in the attack.
Since the Hamas attack, Hezbollah has exchanged cross-border fire with Israel numerous times.
So far, it has remained “somewhat restrained” in the exchange of fire, said Merissa Khurma, director of the Middle East program at the Wilson Center in Washington D.C.
“It’s also learned very hard lessons in 2006 with the war with Israel, and so they are on stand by,” she added.
Despite their religious difference, both Hamas and Hezbollah share a “mutual hatred for Israel and Western states,” said Kislenko. Hamas is a Sunni Muslim group.
But how far Hezbollah is wedded to the notion of a Palestinian cause has always been a big question, he said.
What does the West say about Hezbollah?
The United States, like Canada, has designated Hezbollah as a terrorist organization.
Washington holds Hezbollah responsible for a suicide bombing that destroyed U.S. Marine headquarters in Beirut in 1983, killing 241 servicemen, and a suicide attack the same year on the U.S. embassy.
Hezbollah also hijacked TWA Flight 847 and took roughly 100 foreign hostages between 1982 and 1992, including the CIA chief of station in Beirut, who later died in their custody, according to a U.S. Congressional Research Service report.
The European Union classifies Hezbollah’s military wing as a terrorist group, but not its political wing.
— With files from Global News’ Nathaniel Dove, Reuters and The Associated Press
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