By Tal Shalev.
Hezbollah has lost more than 300 of its people since the organization has gotten involved in the Syrian civil war. It currently operates in three main sites, after its successful assistance of the Al-Qusayr campaign: the eastern rural area of Damascus (Al-Ghouta al-Sharqiyya), the Al-Qalamoun mountain range, north of Damascus, which runs along the Syrian-Lebanese border (the Homs – Damascus route), and the grave of Al-Set Zaynab, south of Damascus.
The reasons for Hezbollah’s involvement in the Syrian crisis look very obvious to the common outsider, as the organization has a strong strategic alliance with the Syrian regime since it was formed in 1982. Yet, senior officers of Hezbollah said to the Kuwaiti newspaper Al-Rai that Hezbollah is fighting in Syria for other reasons, and not necessarily to protect the Syrian regime and President Bashar al-Assad.
Hezbollah, they said, protects Lebanon and seeks to gain control over the area bordering on the Syrian-Lebanese border (the Al-Qalamoun mountain range), out of which organizations affiliated with Al-Qaeda (such as Al-Nusra Front). It also has a sectarian-religious aspect, as Hezbollah is committed to continue defending the grave of Al-Set Zaynab, which is under constant attack by the rebels, who are aware of the site’s religious significance.
Nonetheless, Hezbollah’s involvement in Syria, regardless its reasons, causes a major problem to the organization in Lebanon. The Al-Nusra Front in Lebanon, which is the local franchise of Syria’s Al-Nusra Front, a jihadist rebel movement, has conducted five major suicide bombing at the heart of Hezbollah’s territory – the Dahiyeh in Beirut.
The rebels had recently warned Hezbollah that attacks on their controlled areas will continue until Lebanon releases Sunni Islamist prisoners and the organization withdraws from Syria, which means a declaration of war.
Loyalty is appreciated and strategic alliances even more so. Hezbollah had done for Syria more than any other would have. However, the organization has paid too high a price for its involvement and should understand its place in Lebanon is far more important than the war in Syria. In Syria, the organization is not fighting for its survival, but that of President Assad.
In Lebanon, it is a matter of the organization’s survival. In Lebanon, it is more than a resistance organization, or a terrorist group – it is a political party and a welfare organization as well, with a wide infrastructure that might fall apart if Al-Nusra keeps hunting Hezbollah as it does today.
Should Hezbollah lie itself on the fence for the Syrian regime? Should the organization commit suicide for a strategic alliance? Hassan Nasrallah needs to understand that Hezbollah must survive, and survival is nowhere near the Syrian civil war.
