An expansion of the fighting between Israel and Hezbollah is not a completely excluded possibility. Timo R. Stewart, a senior researcher at the Foreign Policy Institute, still considers Hezbollah’s involvement in the conflict between Israel and Hamas to be unlikely.
in Lebanon the influential military Shia Muslim organization Hezbollah struck northern Israel with rockets and mortars early Sunday. Israel responded to the attack later in the morning by firing artillery into southern Lebanon.
Do the attacks also foreshadow Hezbollah’s involvement in the fighting between Israel and Hamas, the extremist organization active in Gaza?
Timo R. Stewart
Senior researcher at the Foreign Policy Institute Timo R. Stewart considers Hezbollah’s wider involvement still unlikely for the time being.
“Hezbollah seems to have sent a message to Israel that they are monitoring the situation and are ready to act if the situation demands it. I would estimate that Hezbollah’s threshold to participate in the conflict is still quite high.”
According to Stewart, the situation is probably read this way in Israel as well.
“Israel is hardly going to carry out any heavier attacks on the Lebanese border. From Israel’s point of view, Hizbullah is playing the role of a bystander in this conflict for the time being.”
Stewart says that a wider conflict between Israel, Hamas and Hezbollah is certainly not a completely excluded possibility. According to him, it is still in Hezbollah’s interest that the organization does not participate in events beyond the Sunday morning attacks.
“They are not joining out of mere solidarity with Hamas. A lot depends on whether Iran demands Hezbollah to increase the pressure in Israel’s direction.”
This could happen if Israel’s counterattack on Gaza resulted in significant civilian deaths or was exceptionally strong, Stewart estimates. Then Hezbollah might advance to Israel’s border, as a result of which the war would expand to the northern parts of the country.
“At this point, however, the purpose of the grenade fire sent by Hezbollah has mainly been to remind Israel of the organization’s existence.”
Hamas and Hezbollah are united by an ideology based on political Islam. Both organizations also have relations with Iran.
Whereas Hamas represents the Palestinian Sunni Muslims, Hezbollah represents the Lebanese Shia Muslims.
“The organizations have similarities, but also differences. Hamas, for example, in addition to being an Islamist movement, is also a movement of strong Palestinian nationalists, which has its own agenda in the Palestinian territory. Hezbollah’s interests, on the other hand, are strongly linked to the Lebanese region,” says Stewart.
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