Lebanon's Hezbollah Threat

by Mark Silverberg


It is becoming increasingly difficult to determine where Hezbollah control of Lebanon ends and where Lebanese government control begins. The terrorist organization now dictates Iranian decrees to Lebanese officials and institutions, manipulates their activities, and greatly influences the country's decision-making processes through infiltration, intimidation, and terrorism. No decision can be made by the Lebanese government or any of its institutions -- including its military forces -- without Hezbollah's approval.

The U.S. had hoped that bolstering the capabilities of the Lebanese Armes Forces [LAF] would lead to tightened Lebanese control of its border with Syria to prevent arms smuggling; stabilize the region; improve the LAF's counter-terrorism capabilities in dealing with Hezbollah; and generally strengthen the Lebanese state at Hezbollah's expense. But it ignored the fact that the members and commanders of the LAF share the terrorists' dedication to Israel's destruction. Caroline Glick reminds us that "during the 2006 war, the LAF provided Hezbollah commanders with targeting data for their missiles and rockets……..and announced on its official Web site that it would award pensions to families of Hezbollah fighters killed in the war."

Hezbollah's influence has gradually seeped into state institutions, especially the Lebanese army. The LAF's profound weaknesses -- and the level of penetration by Hezbollah -- is one of the main reasons why the LAF seeks to avoid a confrontation. There is a very real danger that, in such an eventuality, the LAF's Shiite contingent (numbering approximately a third of the Lebanese army) would desert and join the Hizbollah terrorist group, leading to another Lebanese civil war.

Of concern to members of the US Congress is the knowledge that the LAF not only provides Hezbollah with intelligence gathered through the use of U.S. and French high-tech signals equipment (as noted below), but contains high-ranking LAF officers closely associated with Hezbollah. According to STRATFOR analyst Reva Bhalla, this is by design. Hezbollah discharges a portion of its recruits after they serve two years in its military wing, then enlists them in the LAF. This has allowed Hezbollah both to control the composition of the LAF's ranking officers and influence specific operations. Given Hezbollah's increasing numbers in the 58,000-strong Lebanese army, a natural bond has developed between Shiites in the LAF and their co-religionists in Hezbollah. Debka reports that shortly after the attack, a group of Iranian intelligence and commando officers toured the border area with LAF escorts which included heads of the 9th battalion, the same LAF military unit that was responsible for the August confrontation along the Lebanon-Israel border . This deadly clash left a senior IDF officer dead and another seriously wounded, highlighting the problem and raising questions about future U.S. government funding of advanced weaponry and equipment for the Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF) -- a policy which, until now, has represented the cornerstone of U.S. efforts to stabilize that country. Evidence indicates that the LAF sniper (a Shiite) was closely associated with Hezbollah (a Shiite terrorist organization); many in Congress fear that such associations between the LAF and Hezbollah go far deeper than meets the eye.

In 2006, the U.S. launched what has now become a $720M military assistance program for the LAF. It was introduced at a time when Lebanon was deeply divided between a Western-backed government and the Hezbollah-led parliamentary opposition. The aid included the provision for a wide variety of weapons and weapons systems; specialized training, using cutting-edge technology through the use of marksmanship simulators; and sophisticated signal-detection equipment that was to have allowed the LAF to identify, decipher and trace Hezbollah's encrypted communications.

This equipment, however, and the intelligence information gathered through its use are being directed against Israel -- not Hezbollah. In April 2009, according to the Los Angeles Times, the chief of Lebanon's U.S.-backed Internal Security Forces warned Hezbollah security chief Wafiq Safa that two trusted, mid-ranking Hezbollah commanders were working as informants for Israeli military intelligence. They were never heard from again. This sharing of supposedly top-secret military intelligence information with Hezbollah eventually decimated Israel's intelligence network in Lebanon. Further, according to STRATFOR, Safa has significantly increased his authority over all Shiite officers in the LAF, maintains close contact with the LAF command; has a say in all appointments, promotions and deployments of Shiite officers; and has arranged to be regularly informed of army movements and plans by LAF commanders.

For U.S. military strategists, it was not meant to be that way. When a pro-American coalition won Lebanon's parliamentary elections in June 2009, conventional wisdom had it that Hezbollah, having been defeated at the polls, would lose its appeal, given that a U.S.-backed government would rule Lebanon. The opposite occurred. In November 2009, the U.S.-backed Sunni leader Saad Hariri was chosen as prime minister only after he agreed to share power with Hezbollah and its allies. The deal resulted in Hariri's government having no influence over Hezbollah's militia and its weapons buildup along the Israeli or Syrian borders. Hezbollah has now become the country's dominant military and political force holding the key to both Lebanese domestic and external stability.

What was overlooked in the decision to provide this multi-million dollar military aid package to the LAF was that the Lebanese and U.S. have differing perceptions on the nature of the threats confronting Lebanon. While both are hostile to al Qaeda-sponsored groups, Lebanon maintains that its primary enemy is Israel. In its annual report on worldwide terrorism, the State Department confirms that the Lebanese government "continues to recognize Hezbollah, a U.S.-designated Foreign Terrorist Organization, as a legitimate resistance group and political party." The U.S., however, sees Hezbollah and the influence of Iran and neighboring Syria over Lebanese affairs as the biggest obstacles to a pro-Western and stable Lebanon.

It is this difference in perception of "the enemy" that concerns members of Congress, who have oversight on the allocation of funds to the Lebanese Army, and who have grown increasingly unhappy with the military assistance program to Lebanon. What the U.S. did not contemplate was that the divisions that once defined Lebanese politics four years ago are no longer valid today. Former political enemies now work in close association with each other, and this association has enhanced the power, influence and prestige of Hezbollah and its master, Iran, throughout Lebanon – at the expense of U.S. and Israeli interests.

The international community cannot plead ignorance in the face of incontrovertible evidence of Lebanon's growing status as a Syrian and Iranian vassal state. Both the U.S. and France need to reassess their military aid to what has become an arm of the Iranian-Syrian axis. Hezbollah continues to serve as the dominant military power in Lebanon, and, as such, determines whether peace or war will prevail on the Israeli border.

In the Second Lebanon War, Israel only fought Hezbollah and directed its attention to Hezbollah military infrastructures. Lebanese military infrastructure was consciously avoided. As a result, while Haifa residents lived in bomb shelters, Beirut residents went to the beach. Should these provocations continue, they will lead to a much more destructive war – one that will be very different from previous wars in one major respect: It will be a war between Israel and Lebanon, and the Lebanese targets that Israel consciously avoided will become legitimate enemy targets subject to destruction.


Mark Silverberg is a foreign policy analyst for the Ariel Center for Policy Research (Israel), a Contributing Editor for Family Security Matters, Arutz Sheva (Israel National News) and the New Media Journal and is a member of Hadassah's National Academic Advisory Board.

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.