Reports | 25 05 2020
The establishment Hezbollah may have been an Iranian objective; an objective that aims to lay extensions of the sectarian Iranian state in many an Arab country—and wherever Shiites may be found. This has been largely achieved in Iraq, after the fall of the American occupation, and the latter delivering Iraq to Iran on a platter; as well as in Lebanon via imposing the hegemony of Hassan Nasrallah over Hezbollah. There also are persistent attempts to impose their control over the Shiites of Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, and the Zaidis in Yemen. These attempts alternate and vary from country to country. Syria, however, was not on that list. This is firstly due to the numerical weakness of the Syrian Shiite community, added to the limited Shiism among Alawites, Ismailis, and Druzes. One may add that there had been an insignificant conversion to Shiism; due mainly to the deteriorating standards of living of those converts—not out of any particular conviction, belief, or a fault with any other faiths! The relative deficiency in the number of Shiites in Syria was compensated by the presence of the regime itself. The views of both the Syrian and Iranian regimes was, thus, united against the Iraqi regime; as well as against the national resistance in Lebanon; and in favor of giving weight to Syria's role in the regional equation. In Lebanon, much effort was extended to “Iranize” its Shiites; as other powers representing the Shiites refused to be subjugated—particularly the Amal group. Hence the inter-Hezbollah coup against Sobhi al-Tufaili, and the formation of the current Party. The latter eliminated the National Lebanese Resistance; thereby complementing the Lebanese sectarian system. The Syrian regime offered a major contribution, in its capacity as the protector of Hezbollah at its inception; via supplies of arms and money—even to the Iranians themselves.
Hezbollah did swim in the tide of resistance; yet at every occasion reiterating its political point of reference resting firmly on the velayat-e faqih [the Iranian Juristocracy] system; meaning that, were it not for major international and regional interventions, Lebanon would have been proclaimed an Iranian state par excellence. Hezbollah’s resistance was established precisely with this reference in mind—and exclusively so. Hassan Nasrallah never wavers, in much of what he says on this point. Claims to morality and idealism, and that it is not a corrupt organization are, as a point of departure, simply not true. Hezbollah has, secondly, played a central role in the construction of Lebanese sectarianism, as well as the increasing sectarianization of the Lebanese people, and the stifling of all modernizing, national, and secular tendencies. Hezbollah as such has besieged Lebanon itself—long before venturing into Syria to set about murdering its people of all sects. It and Iran have, however, abjectly failed in their shared objective of perpetuating the regime. It was specifically this failure that was the cause of Russia’s entry.
Israel has not desisted from attacking Lebanon, while also infringing daily on Syria—even bombarding Hezbollah military targets. Yet this party being Iranian, and the greatest danger facing it now being the demise of this regime—its supporter and Iran’s ally—simply turns its back to Israel; whilst practicing all forms of violence against the Syrian people.
The Syrians could not believe that Hezbollah was coming to kill them. They had been the ones who raced to secure the needs of the families of this party in particular, when Israel attacked Lebanon in 2006. How could it, then, be possible, after all that happened that their repayment be their killing, displacement, and laying siege to the same families that gave the party’s families everything?! There undoubtedly had been exaggerations about Hezbollah's practices; indeed, the party’s intervention initially had been marginal. With the increasing weakness of the regime army’s role, its intervention grew until, by the end of 2011, it was instrumental—alongside other sectarian Shiite militias brought in from a variety of other countries with Iranian money—in stopping the regime from falling. Hezbollah was noted for not embarking on the looting houses—a point in its favor. Yet what it has done in Madaya, by tightening its siege of forty thousand civilians, starving the people, and killing of civilian people of Zabadani, Bouqein, and Madaya itself; has surpassed in its immorality any other immoral act during the time of war—including looting, rape, and many other such heinous crimes.
Worse even than the siege itself, is the reasoning for it. The blockade is part of an Iranian plan, designed to initiate a demographic swap between the people of al-Fu’a and Kefraya in the province of Idlib; and between the people of Zabadani and possibly other surrounding towns. Thereby granting Hezbollah an secured connected swath of territory in both Lebanon and Syria; and thus enabling Iran to impose stronger policies, once the negotiating process commences. In this instance, Hezbollah via Iran turns into a sectarian force of fundamentalism—much like Al-Nusra Front [NF] laying sieged to the Syrian towns Kefraya and al-Fu’a; any pretence of resistance is immediately and wholly abandoned. Hezbollah, in its transformation into a purely—and unambiguously—Iranian power, that is without any pretensions of resistance, turns into a power of passive resistance. This means that it too desires a deal with Israel, as soon as the war in Syria comes to an end. This will be the worst case scenario for Hezbollah; the majority of its fighters lie dead, invalid, and psychologically devastated; with a heavily guilty conscience—if any remains at all—over what it had done to Syrians who protected their families in 2006!
Hezbollah as an Iranian party par excellence was never exposed to us as such before. There had been those who proclaimed such in the past—yet the other sectarian forces in Lebanon, are not much better. Being such, one can comprehend the reasoning behind its siege of Madaya—an act through which it stands equal to the acts of the NF and Daesh, laying siege and starving all those who do not accept their control. Its worst measure, however, is having mobilized the majority of Lebanese, Syrian, and other countries’ Shiites within the context of turning them into Iranian tentacles. Hezbollah is thus decimating the social fabric, forging instead into a sectarian one; and is transforming Shiites in Syria, Iraq and Lebanon into Iranian armed battalions.
The above notwithstanding, we still say: The doctrine of a sizeable Arab group will remain Shiism. The conditions of the Syrian war will come to a close, and Syrians and other Arab peoples will strive to overcome these trenches and their causes. Thus history had been in the past; thus it will be.
* Opinion pieces do not necessarily express the views of Rozana Media.