One drone struck the British RAF base at midnight on Sunday, while two more were intercepted on Monday morning. The drone was a Shahed (Iranian) type and its recovered parts are being studied. The attack on the base, which led to its partial evacuation, has been attributed to the Lebanese Shiite group. The launch of the first drone took place shortly before UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer announced that he would give bases to the United Kingdom to bomb its infrastructure related to the production of ballistic and other missiles.
were sent to intercept it. The alarm lasted for over an hour. The targeting of the base in Akrotiri, Cyprus, shows that Iran’s “proxies” also entered the war, as Hezbollah is Tehran’s closest ally in the region.
marked a new dynamic involvement of Lebanon’s Shiite organization in the war with Israel. This involvement, however, tests not only the endurance of Lebanese society, but also the character of the organization itself, as there are two tendencies within it.
The two trends within Hezbollah
One trend supports at all costs the alliance with Iran, considering the extermination of Khamenei as a red line, and the other wants the “Lebanonization” of the organization, not excluding its transformation into a simple Lebanese political party without armed action.
Hezbollah’s attack on Israel after the death of Khamenei is also related to balances and orientations within the Shiite organization, as its most purist and pro-Iranian part rushed to blackmail the developments. The Israeli intervention in Lebanon, which followed the attack by Hezbollah, consolidated the identity of the latter as an armed organization.
And yet, during the previous period, after the fall of 2024, the weakened Hezbollah generally avoided provocations against Israel, even in cases where the truce was violated. This period of lull – which certainly did not signal a lasting peace, as Israel’s raids on Lebanon left at least 400 dead during the truce – ended on the night of March 1, when Hezbollah’s internal dilemmas took a strong hold on the tendency to reclaim the organization’s pro-Iranian identity, announcing drone attacks on Meron air bases and Ramat David in Israel, but also with rockets against the Nafah base in the occupied Syrian Golan.
How Hezbollah was “born”.
Hezbollah, founded in 1982 during the Israeli occupation of Lebanon, had partly experimented with acquiring a character of Islamic Lebanese nationalism, having even expanded into areas of social welfare and education. However, its religious Shiite character as well as its close economic dependence on Iran had the upper hand. Since March 1, the decision to enter the war on the side of Iran, while a ceasefire was still in place, albeit unenforced, alienated the organization from a part of its base that thinks more in terms of Lebanese nationalism and less in terms of Shiite religiosity.
This was followed by Israeli attacks against the Hezbollah-affiliated al-Mayadeen television network, strikes on weapons depots and command centers, and Israel’s announcement of the occupation of strategic positions in Lebanon to create a buffer zone.
The dilemma has also been transferred to the Lebanese government, which has pledged to prevent rockets from being fired into Israel from Lebanese soil. However, there is reluctance to go ahead with disarming Hezbollah from the Lebanese army, as this would risk plunging the country into civil war due to the Shiite group’s refusal to hand over its weapons.
Lebanon banned Hezbollah’s action
The official Lebanese army remains absent from southern Lebanon, preferring its non-exposure. Army chief Rudolf Haikal said a clash between the army and Hezbollah would be disastrous under the current circumstances. The Lebanese government, of course, confirmed on Monday its decision to ban military action by Hezbollah, which will only be allowed to have political action.
It is important that this decision was agreed to by both ministers who come from the Shiite movement Amal, which is a traditional companion of Hezbollah. Amal leader Nabih Berri, speaker of Lebanon’s parliament, now supports the disarmament of Hezbollah in exchange for international support for the reconstruction of southern Lebanon.
It should be noted that Hezbollah was not actively involved in the 12-day war between the US-Israel and Iran last June. What has changed is that in the current war, regime change in Iran has been expressed as an objective, making it an existential conflict.
Hezbollah armed arm of Iran?
Hezbollah thus once again assumes the character of the “armed arm” of Iran, as the collapse of the regime in Tehran would mean its radical isolation. The scenario of Hezbollah turning into a non-armed party that could survive even a regime change in Iran seems to be receding for the time being, as the hard-line trend in the organization has given a dynamic outlet.
In its official statement on Monday, Hezbollah insisted it was an “act of self-defense,” citing Israel’s “killings, destruction, land theft and other criminal acts.” He even accused the Lebanese government of being complicit with Israel “being unable to impose peace on the enemy and therefore unable to resist his aggression.”
Hezbollah is only one of the external actors involved in the war between Israel and Iran. Ansar Allah’s action in Yemen is also central to Iran’s effort to raise the cost of the war. On the other hand, President Donald Trump reportedly held talks on Sunday with the heads of Iraqi Kurdish factions, Bafil Talabani and Masoud Barzani.
Local or regional war
In the first days of the war, the Israeli bombings focused on the western provinces of Iran, where a Kurdish advance would be possible, while the Baluch ethnicity also poses a question for the cohesion of Iran. The war is thus characterized by Iran’s attempt to expand the war from local to regional throughout the Middle East and, on the other hand, by the US and Israel’s attempt to take it inside Iran through the action of ethnic and social groups.
