ISRAEL HAS A CHOICE TO MAKE
First, the tit-for-tat escalation between these two long-standing foes significantly picked up over the last several months with Israeli assassinations of senior Hezbollah (and Hamas) operatives and intensifying cross-border missile attacks and air strikes.
Some 60,000 Israeli citizens have been displaced on that side of the border, around 100,000 on the other side. In addition, the damage to mostly civilian infrastructure – houses, schools, shops, water supplies, the electricity grid – is also substantial, especially in southern Lebanon.
Any further escalation would simply lead to more human suffering, and, given the experiences of Gaza, a deliberate choice by the Israeli government to embark on such a course of action is hardly likely to persuade Western leaders that they should spend additional political and financial capital on supporting Mr Netanyahu.
Much like the inconclusive 2006 war between Israel and Hezbollah, any new ground offensive by Israeli forces into Lebanon would be a war of choice, and arguably one for the purpose of prolonging Mr Netanyahu’s political survival.
What’s more, today’s Hezbollah is a far more potent adversary than it was nearly two decades ago when it managed to fight Israeli forces to a stalemate. Its links with its main backer, Iran, are more solid, and have enabled the group to build up a significant arsenal of sophisticated weapons that, if deployed en masse, could easily overwhelm Israel’s air defences and cause substantial casualties and damage to military and civilian infrastructure.
The so-called axis of resistance, controlled by Tehran, could additionally renew its efforts not only to target Israel but also the interests of its Western allies in the region and beyond.
Therefore, an Israeli choice of escalation, and especially one that carries significant risks of both an inconclusive outcome of the war with Hezbollah and of a wider regional escalation that the West has worked hard to avoid over the past eleven and a half months since Oct 7, is unlikely to lead to sustained, let alone increased, support for Israel.
Source: CNA
