The Israeli James Bond-style attack and Hezbollah’s next steps
The events of Tuesday afternoon in Lebanon sound like they were taken out of a James Bond movie, as sabotaged pagers used by Hezbollah exploded simultaneously across the country, injuring some 3,000 people, the vast majority of whom were members of the terror organization.
Hassan Nasrallah
It appears that Israel had access to more than just communication devices. Its decision to detonate the sabotaged pager devices was a response to Hezbollah’s attempt to assassinate the former Israel Defense Forces chief of staff Aviv Kochavi, foiled just days ago. Hezbollah, on its part, was quick to point to Israel as the perpetrator of the large-scale attack and vowed to retaliate.
As the ball is now in Hezbollah’s court, Nasrallah is the man to follow. The long-standing head of Iran’s crown jewel proxy is known for his deep understanding of Israel’s decision-making calculations. He now faces one of the most crucial decisions of his career.
Nasrallah has said for months that Hezbollah is not interested in escalating the ongoing fighting with Israel to an all-out war. He will now need to come up with a retaliation to answer a mixture of conditions regarding the nature of the target, its geographic location and the appropriate weapon to hit it with—in a way that will send Israel a fierce message without creating a deterioration in the situation.
Finding this appropriate “Goldilocks” retaliation is increasingly tricky as Hezbollah finds itself confronting an Israeli rival that is less and less willing to contain such attacks. The Israeli government faces rising domestic pressure from both the public and the military command to take a much more aggressive approach against Hezbollah’s attacks on northern Israel. The government’s recent decision to formally include the return of civilians to their homes in the north as a war objective should also be seen as a sign of its new focus.
Nasrallah should be closely watching Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, who is traditionally seen as risk-aversive. Netanyahu’s recent aggressive approach towards the United States and his rejection of any potential diplomatic attempt to reach a ceasefire in Gaza and Lebanon reflect his intentions to continue the military campaign despite the risk of further escalation and widening of the war.
Nonetheless, many analysts believe Israel will heed Washington’s call not to escalate the conflict. Still, Nasrallah must consider that the domestic political pressures on Netanyahu, along with his tense relations with Washington, could lead him to order to widen the campaign against Hezbollah.
Furthermore, Nasrallah should consider the possibility that due to the upcoming presidential election in the United States, Israel might see the current timing as an opportunity to attack Hezbollah, believing that the Democrats need to secure the Jewish vote which will force Washington to stand by Israel.
The combination of Israel’s intelligence superiority, as demonstrated in the “pagers attack” (possibly the first of many), the rising domestic pressure to deal with Hezbollah “once and for all,” and the possibility of a weakened American restraining factor on the Israeli decision-makers puts Nasrallah on the spot—as one step in the wrong direction could cost Hezbollah, and Lebanon as a whole, dearly.
After the 2006 war with Israel, Nasrallah later admitted that had he known the attack he had authorized on the Israeli border would lead to an all-out war, he would never have approved it. Let us hope that he remembers that lesson.
