“Lost its shine, its stronghold, and its passage”: Hezbollah in 2024, “From Connection to Separation”

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At the beginning of 2024, Hezbollah was a significant player, but by the end of the year, its role had become marginal. What were the key moments between these two roles?

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It all began on October 8, 2023, when Hezbollah decided to join the “support war” for Gaza, one day after Israel launched its offensive on the Gaza Strip, following the unprecedented attack by Hamas on Israeli settlements surrounding Gaza.

The War under the Rules of Engagement

The “support war” remained within the framework of “rules of engagement” carefully defined between Hezbollah and Israel for several months. It was limited to exchanges of fire between the two parties, but included significant operations such as the assassination of the deputy head of Hamas’s political office and its representative in Lebanon, Saleh al-Arouri, in the southern suburbs of Beirut, Hezbollah‘s stronghold, in January of the current year.

In response to this assassination, Hezbollah launched dozens of rockets and drones towards Israel.

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The Turning Point

The war remained a back-and-forth until the escalation led to a broader conflict on July 30, 2024, with the death of Hezbollah‘s number two, who was targeted in an airstrike in the Haret Hreik neighborhood in the southern suburbs. This operation marked the end of the rules of engagement that had governed the confrontation between Hezbollah and Israel since the end of the July 2006 war.

The killing of Fouad Cheker was followed by a response from Hezbollah, claiming to have struck a “military target deep in Israel.”

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Black September

The death of Fouad Cheker signaled the transition to a full-scale war, confirmed by the successive blows Hezbollah received in September of the past year.

The escalation began with a major strike against Hezbollah, as Israel destroyed “Pager” and “Icom” communication devices over two consecutive days. On September 17, Israel targeted the “Pagere” devices used by Hezbollah, killing 12 people and injuring around 2,800 others. The next day, 14 people were killed, and more than 450 were injured in explosions targeting the “Icom 82” devices used by Hezbollah in various regions of Lebanon.

At that moment, former Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant stated that “the center of gravity is moving north, and resources are being redistributed.”

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Hezbollah‘s Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah admitted that the Pager explosions were a painful blow to the group, but he did not yet know that what was to come would be much worse.

After targeting Hezbollah‘s communication system, killing its leaders and its head Hassan Nasrallah, destroying its most fortified bases, and breaching its security in an unprecedented way, the southern suburbs of Beirut went from a Hezbollah stronghold to a cemetery for its leaders from the first and second ranks of its military hierarchy. However, Nasrallah‘s death on September 27 was the hardest blow to the group, due to his significance not only in Lebanon but also in the hierarchy of the so-called “axis of resistance,” along with his passionate rhetoric that gave him a charisma now gone after his death.

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83 tons of explosives were dropped by Israeli planes on Hezbollah‘s headquarters in the southern suburbs, killing Nasrallah, who was attending a meeting on the fourteenth underground floor with group leaders and a senior officer from the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, to plan Hezbollah‘s response to the series of assassinations targeting its leaders.

A few days after Nasrallah’s death, Israel targeted his potential successor, Hashem Safi El-Din, in a similar facility in the southern suburbs of Beirut, plunging the party into a phase that resembled a “loss of consciousness,” coinciding with the intensification of its war with Israel, which sought to exploit this situation to inflict maximum damage on Hezbollah and its military structure in southern Lebanon, as well as its political sphere in the southern suburbs.

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Nasrallah’s death coincided with intense bombing of southern Lebanon and the southern suburbs of Beirut, targeting Hezbollah‘s military and financial infrastructure, as well as its bases and support zones. By the end of this “black September,” Israel began a ground invasion into the south.

Restoring Balance

With the onset of direct combat between Israel and Hezbollah, the latter regained some balance by repelling the Israeli army at the front-line villages, causing casualties among soldiers and vehicles. Additionally, Naïm Qassem was appointed as interim Secretary-General, succeeding Nasrallah.

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Hezbollah succeeded in targeting the Golani Brigade, killing several of its soldiers, and attacked Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu‘s house in Caesarea, in addition to hitting important air and military bases.

Drones were the key to many of Hezbollah‘s effective strikes on Israel, being difficult to detect via radar or intercept by fighter jets.

As the conflict expanded, Israel began bombing the heart of Beirut under the pretext of targeting Hezbollah leaders, to which Hezbollah responded by hitting Tel Aviv, seeking to establish the “pain” equation mentioned by Qassem.

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After a hot day in Tel Aviv due to fires caused by Hezbollah missiles, both parties announced a ceasefire on Wednesday, November 27, according to an agreement sponsored by France and the United States.

Separation of Fronts

The agreement that ended the fighting in Lebanon effectively separated Hezbollah from the Gaza Strip and established a monitoring mechanism to implement UN Security Council Resolution 1701, with the formation of a commission headed by an American general to monitor violations from both sides. Israel would continue its withdrawal from southern Lebanon within 60 days, while Hezbollah would withdraw north of the Litani River. The Lebanese government would be responsible for monitoring the borders to ensure no weapons reached Hezbollah.

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Thus, the war that began to support Gaza ended with restrictions on Hezbollah in the south and the destruction of its stronghold in the southern suburbs of Beirut, excluding Hezbollah from the ongoing Gaza war equation and the loss of its leader, thus losing its prominence and its stronghold.

No Corridor from Iran

The end of Bashar al-Assad’s rule intensified the challenges for Hezbollah, given its alliance with the regime and Syria’s role as a key passage for the party to Iran. The capture of Damascus by Syrian armed factions, led by “Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham,” whom Hezbollah had fought for years, ended the smooth flow of arms from Iran to Hezbollah through Syria, as acknowledged by Hezbollah’s Secretary-General Naïm Qassem in his latest speech, where he stated that the party lost its corridors after the fall of the Syrian regime.

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In this context, Dr. Michel Chmaoui, Lebanese researcher and political writer, said that “Israel has destroyed Hezbollah militarily, along with its supportive environment, in addition to dealing a severe blow to its political standing.”

Chmaoui added that “the defeat suffered by Hezbollah in 2024 does not mark its end, but the end will come if it persists in the same path, as expressed by its current Secretary-General, who said that resistance is shining, and we are rebuilding our capabilities.”

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He added, “If Hezbollah continues with this discourse, it will inevitably mean a violation of the ceasefire agreement, and Israel, in cooperation with the international community, will target the party once again to annihilate it, as well as its military, political, and social strongholds.”

The Lebanese political researcher believed that “Hezbollah sealed its fate by involving its military wing in the Gaza support war a few months ago.”

Regarding the military aspect, Chmaoui explained that it would be difficult for Hezbollah to rebuild its military capabilities after suffering blows to its supply routes.

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