What the attack in Beirut means for the war with Hezbollah

It looks as if someone had drawn a zigzag line through the green mountains with a large pen. “Lebanon is on the right, Israel on the left,” says Olga Yifrah, pointing to the border wall. Her village, Avdon, is only three and a half kilometers from the Lebanese border. Hezbollah rockets have been falling here regularly for almost a year. “It’s so peaceful right now,” said the chairwoman of the local council on Friday afternoon. The almost 200 rockets that the Shiite militia fired at Israel that day were aimed primarily at villages and towns further east. “But the situation could explode at any moment.”

Yifrah’s words are prophetic. Just a few hours later, Israel’s air force flew an attack on a residential building in Dahiye, the Hezbollah stronghold in the south of the Lebanese capital Beirut. On Saturday morning, it was clear: Israel had killed several high-ranking commanders of the Lebanese Shiite militia, including Ibrahim Akil. He commanded the Hezbollah elite Radwan units. Ahmed Wahbi, the man responsible for training new fighters, was also among those killed. The attack deepened the militia’s crisis – and could escalate the entire “situation” on the Lebanese-Israeli border.

With Akil, Israel has killed the terrorist organization’s most important military commander just a few days after the attacks on Hezbollah’s pagers and radios. The killing of Akil is comparable to that of Fuad Shukr at the end of July, whom Israel also killed in Beirut, writes Hezbollah expert Hanin Ghaddar on X. “Without its communications system and military leadership, Hezbollah cannot conduct efficient military operations.”

Nevertheless, the militia can hardly leave such a violent wave of Israeli attacks unanswered – and Israel has already announced that it will further increase military pressure on Hezbollah. Is a major war now looming?

Israel’s “new phase” of the war

At least one thing seems clear: the new phase of the war on the northern border has begun with full force. Defense Minister Yoav Gallant chose these words on Wednesday after the second wave of explosions of communication devices in Lebanon. From now on, the fight against Hezbollah is the first priority, and troops will be withdrawn from the Gaza Strip for this purpose.

“Israel has decided to escalate the situation carefully and gradually,” says Giora Eiland, who headed Israel’s National Security Council until 2006. The former major general of the Israeli Defense Forces does not believe that the attack in Beirut is a preparation for a full-scale war with Hezbollah.

If Israel had wanted war, including an invasion, Wednesday would have been the best time, when Hezbollah’s communications infrastructure was largely paralyzed. Nevertheless, Israel has changed its strategy and will now carry out stronger and more painful attacks against Hezbollah – in order to force the Shiite militia to change course.

Israel’s goal: to decouple the fronts

Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah announced again on Thursday that his militia would not stop its attacks on northern Israel until the guns fell silent in the Gaza Strip. Israeli security experts believe that Israel now wants to increase the pressure on Hezbollah in order to decouple the two fronts in the south and the north.

“The Israeli government has apparently come to the conclusion that the chances of a ceasefire in Gaza are very, very slim,” says Eiland. The costs for Hezbollah are to be driven up so much that the militia decides to end the border war even without a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip.

Israel is attempting a balancing act: escalation without crossing the line into full-scale war. Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said on Friday: “The series of operations in the new phase of the war will continue until we have achieved our goal: the safe return of Israel’s northern communities to their homes.” At the same time, army spokesman Daniel Hagari made it clear that Israel is not aiming for a full-scale escalation in the region.

But whether this happens depends not only on Israel. According to security experts, Hezbollah is still not interested in a major war, but is now forced to respond to this week’s humiliating attacks. If a retaliatory strike by the Shiite Islamists causes many civilian casualties in Israel, a harsh counterattack can be expected. The more both sides turn the spiral of escalation, the more likely a major war becomes – even if neither Israel nor Hezbollah want it.

In places where the effects of a full-scale war would be most noticeable, resignation has spread after almost a year of Hezbollah shelling. Olga Yifrah from the border village of Avdon sent a text message on Saturday morning: “We always expect attacks here – probably next time with more rockets,” the 44-year-old wrote. “Nothing has changed.”