It has become a cliché of analysis of Israeli strategy in the period since October 7 2023 to state that while before this fateful date, Jerusalem sought only to contain and deter its regional adversaries, it now seeks their comprehensive defeat. Like most clichés, this one contains an element of truth. It also conceals a fair dose of wishful thinking.
It is undoubtedly the case that before October 7, Israel operated under the notion that deterrence of enemies was likely to prove sufficient, preserving Israeli lives and resources. As one senior official put it to me during that time, “If you have good fences, you don’t need to worry too much about what’s on the other side.”
No one would voice such a sentiment today. The Hamas massacres drove home to the Israeli system the implacable nature of Israel’s Islamist enemies, and reinforced the view that only a strategy intended to lead to their complete defeat could provide security.
Subsequent Israeli practice has inflicted telling blows on a range of regional adversaries. As a result, the Iran-led “Mehwar al Muqawama”, or Axis of Resistance, has over the past two years been massively weakened. Hamas in Gaza today is a shadow of its former self, its silence in the current war a reflection of this fact. The Yemeni Houthis were badly damaged by Israeli and US attacks and appear similarly reluctant to engage in the current round.
Yet overall, it is important to note that of the various components of Iran’s Axis, only one has so far permanently departed the stage as a result of the dramatic events in the region over the last two and a half years. This is the Assad regime in Syria. Its demise was brought about as a partial byproduct, rather than a direct result, of Israeli actions.
On every other front, the net result so far has been the weakening, not the destruction, of the various components of the enemy alliance, up to and including the Iranian regime itself. So far, the events of this war have not shown signs of decisively breaking this mould. As of now, the war is being fought on two, or perhaps two and a half fronts: Iran itself, Lebanon – after the Hezbollah organisation there chose to enter the fray of its own accord, and Iraq, where Shia militias have carried out a series of missile and drone attacks on US facilities in recent days.
Iranian air defences have effectively ceased to exist. Israeli aircraft began this week, for the first time, striking Iranian oil depots in Tehran. Israel is hitting around 400 targets a day, inflicting huge damage on Iran’s missile sites, airports and infrastructure of governance. There is little sign, however, that any of this is leading towards a general collapse of the regime’s ability to govern. The regime, so far at least, appears to be maintaining the crucial loyalty of its own security personnel, and of the 20 per cent or so of the population that is generally reckoned to support it. It is aware that it is fighting for its life and it is employing its own counter strategy. Unless a popular uprising begins, or the US and Israel begin to activate a strategy to stand up and support armed opposition on the ground, it is difficult to see how anything more than severe damage to the regime can be achieved.
In Lebanon, similarly, Israel is striking at Hezbollah targets throughout the country, including in Beirut. IDF troops have reinforced their pre-existing deployment north of the border. For the first time, large populations have been ordered from their homes by the IDF in preparation for attacks. Senior Iranian commanders supervising Hezbollah activities on Lebanese soil have been successfully targeted, up to and including Reza Khazaei, commander of the IRGC’s Lebanon Corps.
This has led to some unprecedented developments in Lebanon. Prime Minister Nawaf Salam has for the first time declared Hezbollah’s military activity illegal. There is evidence of real public fury at Hezbollah’s decision to attack Israel and draw Lebanon once more into a conflict, after the devastating Israeli response to Hezbollah’s 2023 attacks.
But once again, the likelihood that the Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF) will act to implement the prime minister’s demand seems slim in the extreme. Lebanese Chief of Staff Rodolphe Haykal has already said that Israel’s attacks are hindering his force’s plans to carry out Hezbollah’s disarmament. In fact, Haykal’s force, which consists of about 50 per cent Shia Lebanese, including about 30 per cent of its officer corps, would probably split apart if the chief of staff actually attempted to implement the government’s directive. Since Israel has no intention of invading Lebanon in its entirety, while nothing in Lebanon is willing or able to dismantle Hezbollah, we arrive at a similar point. Israel can severely degrade Tehran’s Lebanese clients. But it is difficult to see how it can finish them.
What could change this picture would be a joint US and Israeli decision to pursue a long-war strategy to bring down the Iranian regime, involving the support for both armed and unarmed elements on the ground. As of now, the adoption of such a strategy appears unlikely. The result is that while the forcefulness and dimensions of Israel’s security approach have undoubtedly changed profoundly since October 7, it nevertheless appears likely, unless something significantly changes, that both Iran and its Lebanese proxy will survive the present war.
Jonathan Spyer is an analyst, writer, and journalist of Middle Eastern affairs.
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