Lebanon’s ceasefire could bring down Iran’s mullahs
The ceasefire agreed between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon is good news not just because it promises to bring the terrible bloodshed of the past few months to an end. It also represents a major setback for Iran, the primary backer of the Lebanese terrorist group that provoked the conflict in the first place by maintaining a continual missile barrage against civilians in northern Israel.
As the key backer of Hezbollah and Hamas – responsible for causing the year-long hostilities in the Middle East – Iran has a great deal to answer for.
Reluctant to engage the Israelis in a direct war they know they are certain to lose, the ayatollahs’ preferred modus operandi is to finance and equip Islamist groups to do their dirty work.
Hezbollah’s decision – taken in the immediate aftermath of Hamas’s deadly assault against Israel on October 7 last year – to launch its own bombardment against civilian communities in northern Israel, was Iran’s way of indicating that it stood four-square behind Hamas without having to involve itself directly in the conflict.
Hezbollah’s ability to maintain its steady bombardment against Israel for the best part of a year was due to the constant supply of arms provided by Tehran, with most of the weaponry making its way to southern Lebanon courtesy of the Syrian regime of Bashar al-Assad, Iran’s closest ally in the region.
The destruction that the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) have visited upon Hezbollah’s terrorist infrastructure in the time since Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu launched “Operation Northern Arrows” two months ago represents a serious humiliation for Iran’s Islamic Republic, from which it could struggle to recover.
Apart from seeing the complex network of tunnels and missile launch sites it helped to construct in southern Lebanon destroyed, Iran has been impotent to prevent Israel’s clinical assassination of the terrorist group’s key commanders – including its influential spiritual leader, Hassan Nasrallah.
Iran has suffered a similar humiliation in Gaza, where Israel’s year-long military offensive has reduced Hamas’s Iranian-financed terrorist infrastructure to rubble.
In such circumstances, the Iranian regime, which finds itself increasingly under pressure from a disaffected populace, had little option but to bring hostilities to an end. All the indications are that Iran, not Hezbollah, was the driving force behind diplomatic efforts to end the fighting in Lebanon, as it feared that its standing in the region would be further eroded the longer the conflict carried on. Hezbollah, by contrast, was keen to continue its attacks against Israel, as can be seen from the fact that the terror group was still firing rockets into northern Israel right up to the final minutes before the ceasefire came into force.
Hezbollah’s determination to maintain hostilities against Israel will be a key factor in whether the ceasefire currently in place morphs into a more permanent arrangement. Attempts by Hezbollah supporters to return to their former bases in southern Lebanon have already prompted Israeli defence minister Israel Katz to warn that the IDF will use “forceful” action to prevent Hezbollah regrouping in border villages.
Hezbollah’s disdain for a ceasefire deal follows the Hamas leadership’s constant refusal to accept ceasefire terms brokered by the Biden administration. From their perspective, the longer the conflicts in Gaza and southern Lebanon continue, the more pressure Israel will come under from world leaders to make concessions.
The willingness of both Hezbollah and Hamas to continue fighting, even if it means incurring further heavy losses, certainly places Tehran in a difficult position, with the ayatollahs now facing accusations that they have betrayed their allies in Gaza and southern Lebanon.
Iran’s attempts to portray itself as a regional superpower lie in tatters now that a ceasefire has been agreed in southern Lebanon, with the expectation that a similar agreement may soon come into force in Gaza.
Iran’s isolation will deepen further if the Lebanese government, which, after all, is supposed to have ultimate responsibility for defending its territory, deploys its military to secure Lebanon’s southern border, instead of sub-contracting the task to Iranian-backed terrorists.
The calamitous collapse of Iran’s carefully-constructed terrorist network in the Middle East could even have serious implications for the ayatollahs’ own survival prospects, with prominent Iranian opposition figures, such as Maryam Rajavi, the head of the National Council of Resistance of Iran, predicting the Islamic Republic’s imminent demise.
Having wasted billions of dollars establishing terrorist networks throughout the region, the ayatollahs are likely to find themselves under increasing pressure from disaffected voters who believe the money would have been better spent reviving Iran’s basket-case economy, where inflation is running at 35 per cent and youth unemployment is more than 20 per cent.
With the Trump administration – likely to take a hard line on Iran – about to assume power in Washington, the ceasefire deal in Lebanon could be the first indication that the ayatollahs’ days are numbered.