(Source: Wikipedia)
Table Of Contents:
EXCLUSIVE: Iran Tasked Nasrallah with Uniting Iraqi Proxies after Soleimani’s Death: Suadad al-Salhy, Middle East Eye, Jan. 14, 2020
Iran’s Response to Soleimani’s Killing Is Coming: Sam Dahger, The Atlantic, Jan. 14, 2020
Hezbollah Has Prepared for This Moment for Decades: Brian Katz, Foreign Affairs, Jan. 14, 2020
Lebanon’s Political-Economic Crisis: Ramifications for Israel: Tomer Fadlon, Sason Hadad, Elisheva Simon. INSS Insight No. 1251, Jan. 16, 2020
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EXCLUSIVE: Iran Tasked Nasrallah with Uniting Iraqi Proxies after Soleimani’s Death
Suadad al-Salhy
Middle East Eye, Jan. 14, 2020
The leaders of Iranian-backed paramilitary groups in Iraq have agreed to put their differences aside and back Hadi al-Amiri as the new chairman of the Popular Mobilisation Forces (PMF) as part of a wider plan brokered by Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah to quell tensions between the groups and create a “united resistance” to US troops in the country.
The informal agreement was forged at a meeting convened in Beirut on Thursday after Nasrallah was asked by Iran to organise its Iraqi factions following the assassinations of Iranian general Qassem Soleimani and Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, the de facto leader of the PMF, in a US drone strike in Baghdad on 3 January.
Most of the leaders then flew to Tehran on Sunday, before moving onto the Iranian city of Qom on Monday where they also met with influential Iraqi cleric Moqtada al-Sadr in a significant display of Shia unity.
While the stated purpose of these meetings was to rally groups commonly opposed to the US presence in Iraq, sources told Middle East Eye that they were also convened to address the leadership vacuum and quell in-fighting over long-simmering feuds between rival Iran-backed militias in the wake of the killings of Soleimani and Muhandis. “All these meetings were attempting to gather the factions after they have been devastated in an unprecedented way,” a prominent Shia politician familiar with these meetings told Middle East Eye. “Even the meeting with Sadr was heading in this direction, and it is part of the attempts to break the ice with him and drag him to the camp [of the pro-Iranian factions].”
Meetings in Beirut, Tehran and Qom
Commanders and senior officials within most of the most prominent pro-Iran armed factions, including Asaib Ahl al-Haq, Kataeb Hezbollah, Kataib Jund al-Imam, Kataib Sayyid al-Shuhada and Kataib al-Imam Ali, arrived in Beirut on Thursday in response to Nasrallah’s call for them to “set aside differences” and promote calm in the aftermath of the US strikes.
At the same time, many of Iraq’s top politicians and the leaders of other armed factions, including Amiri, the leader of the Iran-backed Badr Organisation who was nominated as Muhandis’ successor less than 24 hours after his death, went to Tehran to offer their condolences to Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei over the killing of Soleimani.
As most returned to Baghdad, Amiri and Akram al-Kaabi, the commander of the Huzballah al-Najaba Brigades, remained there, where they were joined on Sunday by most of the leaders who had met Nasrallah in Beirut.
Less than 24 hours later, the group travelled to Qom where they were photographed meeting Sadr, who has been pursuing religious studies there for months, and two of his top military aides, Abu Doaa al-Issawi and Abu Yasser al-Kaabi. One of the attendees who participated in the meeting said in a press statement: “The aim of the meeting with Sadr was to prepare the ground for the creation of a united resistance front to dislodge the American forces and all foreign forces from Iraq and coordinate to unify the positions.”
But several Shia commanders and politicians familiar with what was discussed have told MEE that the series of meetings was mostly directed at resolving internal tensions and disputes between the different groups that make up the PMF, a government-organised umbrella group of Shia militia factions also known as Hashd al-Shaabi which was created in 2014 to fight alongside Iraqi security forces and Kurdish forces against the Islamic State group.
The PMF’s factions divide into three main groups. The first is linked to the supreme religious authority in Najaf represented by Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani; the second is associated with Sadr; while the last group, which represents the most numerous and best armed, is associated with Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corp (IRGC). … [To read the full article, click the following LINK – Ed.]
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Iran’s Response to Soleimani’s Killing Is Coming
Sam Dahger
The Atlantic, Jan. 14, 2020
About two years ago, Qassem Soleimani delivered a speech at a ceremony in Tehran marking a decade since the death of Imad Mughniyeh, the senior Hezbollah commander killed in a car-bomb explosion in the heart of Damascus, an attack carried out by the CIA with support from Israel. Standing in front of a huge portrait of Mughniyeh superimposed against a panorama of Jerusalem, Soleimani addressed an audience of senior Iranian officials, as well as representatives of Iran’s proxy militias in Iraq, Lebanon, the Palestinian territories, Syria, and Yemen.
Soleimani hailed Mughniyeh as “the legend” responsible for practically all the achievements of Iran’s so-called axis of resistance, which according to the Iranian general included building Hezbollah and the Palestinian group Hamas into formidable threats to Israel and killing 241 American service members in the 1983 bombing of a U.S. Marine barracks in Beirut. “The enemy knows that punishment for Imad’s blood is not firing a missile or a tit-for-tat assassination,” he told the crowd. “The punishment for Imad’s blood is the eradication of the Zionist entity.”
Following Soleimani’s killing in an American air strike this month, it is worth remembering the man’s own words. Soleimani, Mughniyeh, and the current Hezbollah leader, Hassan Nasrallah, formed a trio of men who carried out Iran’s strategy across the Middle East under Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. And so, it is hard to overstate the magnitude of the blow that Soleimani’s death has delivered. The focus in the days since his killing has been on the perceived impulsiveness of Donald Trump’s decision, Iran’s retaliation—limited thus far to the firing of 22 missiles at two U.S. bases in Iraq, with no reported casualties—the public displays of grief for Soleimani in Iran, and the national- security implications. But as with Mughniyeh’s death, to paraphrase Soleimani himself, the response to the Iranian general’s killing will not be restricted to a lone missile attack or a tit-for-tat move—Iran is not yet done.
Take the case of Mughniyeh. In the summer of 2012, a Hezbollah suicide bomber killed five Israeli tourists and a driver in an attack in a Bulgarian resort town. U.S. and Israeli officials suspected that the bombing, which occurred four years after Mughniyeh’s death, was retaliation for the Hezbollah commander’s killing, as well as for the assassination of Iranian nuclear scientists, which Tehran blamed on Israel. “I have received many messages from brothers in the resistance asking for permission to carry out martyrdom operations” to avenge Soleimani’s death, Nasrallah said during a speech aired at memorial services for Soleimani held throughout Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley and the country’s south. Revenge, he continued, will be a “long” battle.
For now, in responding to Soleimani’s killing, self-preservation and maintaining staying power mandate restraint. The strike that killed him also killed Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, who commanded the largest of the seven main Iraqi proxy militias working for Iran, according to Hisham al-Hashimi, a Baghdad-based security analyst with the European Institute of Peace.
Iran’s ability to retaliate is also complicated by the fact that it is loathed by most Iraqis, including its fellow Shiites, who recently attacked Iran’s missions in Baghdad and the south of Iraq. Iraqi Shiites blame Iran and the militias and parties affiliated with it for killing more than 500 protesters in Iraq since October, and they see these same actors as being behind much of the corruption and plundering of the country’s resources that has hobbled Iraq’s ability to deliver services and economic opportunities to its citizens. Mounting economic sanctions imposed by the Trump administration on Iran and its allies in Iraq will also restrict their room to maneuver.
Similar dynamics are at play in Lebanon, home to Hezbollah, Iran’s most powerful regional proxy force. Once beloved as a resistance movement that liberated southern Lebanon from Israeli occupation in 2000, Hezbollah is now regarded by many Lebanese as part and parcel of the corrupt, dysfunctional, and sectarian political class that has brought the country to the brink of economic collapse. Residents of predominantly Shiite cities in southern Lebanon such as Nabatieh and Tyr, which are seen as bastions of support for Hezbollah, have even joined their fellow Lebanese in protests that have been ongoing for months. … [To read the full article, click the following LINK – Ed.]
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Hezbollah Has Prepared for This Moment for Decades
Brian Katz
Foreign Affairs, Jan. 14, 2020
What is just retribution?” So asked Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah in a speech on January 5, two days after the United States killed Iranian Quds Force commander Qasem Soleimani and Iraqi Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF) commander Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis in a drone strike in Baghdad. With no American official “on par with Soleimani or Muhandis,” in Nasrallah’s estimation, the answer was to retaliate against “the American military presence in our region.” American civilians shouldn’t be harmed, he said, but “the U.S. bases, the U.S. warships, every American soldier and officer” in the Middle East would all be fair game.
Hezbollah is unlikely to pick a fight with the United States by itself. The group has its own tensions with Israel to worry about, and huge domestic protests jeopardize its political grip on Lebanon. It also suffered heavy losses in Syria, where it fought hand-in-glove with Iran to prop up President Bashar al-Assad. But not wanting a war isn’t the same as being unwilling to fight one. Hezbollah has been preparing for this day for decades, building up military, terrorist, and cyber capabilities in Lebanon, the Middle East, and around the world in order to strike back at the United States and anyone else who might join a war against Iran and its allies. Now, because of its ideological commitment to and military interdependence with Iran, the group may have no choice but to enter a conflict with the United States.
Last week’s Iranian missile attack on two Iraqi bases that host U.S. forces was Tehran’s initial, symbolic, and overt response to Soleimani’s death. The full response will unfold in the coming months and years—and will likely feature Hezbollah in a starring role. Playing to its strengths and avoiding a direct conventional confrontation with the United States, the Quds Force and its Hezbollah partner may attempt to orchestrate a regional campaign of asymmetric attacks across the Middle East and possibly outside of it. Their goal will be to disrupt, threaten, and restrict the operations of U.S. soldiers, diplomats, and intelligence officers to the point that the benefits of their presence in the Middle East no longer outweigh the costs.
BROTHERS IN ARMS
Since its founding by the Iranian Quds Force in the early 1980s, Hezbollah has forged and sought to balance two identities. The first is as a Lebanese actor, with a powerful military, political, religious, and socioeconomic apparatus capable of advancing its domestic goals and empowering its Shiite constituents. The second is as a proxy turned ally of Iran, loyal to its so-called axis of resistance, which includes the Syrian regime, Hamas, and various regional Shiite militias such as the PMF. But balancing both identities has been difficult. Over the decades, tensions among Iran, the United States, and Israel have periodically flared, and Hezbollah has found itself walking a narrow line, seeking to support Iran militarily without provoking a U.S. response that would threaten its achievements in Lebanon. In 2006, cross-border attacks between Hezbollah and Israel escalated into a devastating Israeli air and ground campaign in southern Lebanon and Beirut. Since then, the group has sought to avoid unnecessary hostilities with Israel. Instead, it has focused on deterrence by building up an arsenal of advanced missiles and issuing measured, proportional responses to Israeli strikes.
But the magnitude of the Soleimani strike—which killed both Hezbollah’s Iranian patron and the commander of the PMF, the group’s closest Iraqi ally—may necessitate retaliation. And dependence on Iran will not be the only impetus for such action. Hezbollah will likely feel the need to demonstrate resolve to its constituents and its adversaries. The group may already fear that the United States and Israel are gearing up to attack it, in which case it will likely seek to deter both countries by reminding them of its asymmetric capabilities. … [To read the full article, click the following LINK – Ed.]
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Lebanon’s Political-Economic Crisis: Ramifications for Israel
Tomer Fadlon, Sason Hadad, Elisheva Simon
INSS Insight No. 1251, Jan. 16, 2020
The crisis rocking Lebanon in recent months stems in part from deep economic problems that have afflicted the country for many years. These are joined by new problems that have arisen over the past decade and exacerbated an economic crisis seen by many as the worst since the end of the civil war in 1990. The immediate trigger for the outbreak of the popular protest in October 2019 was a proposal to tax social media.
Lebanon’s GDP was estimated at $56 billion in 2018, with an average annual growth of 1 percent reported over the last three years. Despite early forecasts of higher growth in 2019, an International Monetary Fund report gave an updated and reduced forecast, and currently only 0.2 percent growth is expected. In recent years Lebanon’s economy has depended on banking (40 percent of GDP), as well as agriculture, industry, and tourism, which according to the IMF is at its strongest since 2010. In 2019 Lebanon’s debt-to-GDP ratio exceeded 150 percent and heralds a major crisis and swift downgrading in the country’s credit rating, with serious harm both to banking and currency strength, as well as to the ability to secure loans for debt redemptions.
The two deep problems weighing on Lebanon’s economy are inter-linked. The first is endemic corruption: the organization Transparency International ranks Lebanon 138 among 175 countries assessed. Corruption in Lebanon is manifested especially in nepotism and budget-inflation to line the pockets of those close to power. Thus, for example, in July 2017 public sector salaries rose by dozens of percentage points, while private sector salaries did not enjoy any increase. The only way to fund the higher salaries and inflated budgets is through taxes on the population, which have ballooned in recent years and burdened the private sector.
The second problem is political instability, which is linked to Lebanon’s community structure and greatly limits the Lebanese government’s freedom of action and ability to implement reforms. The instability makes it hard for the government to meet the public’s basic demands, including sanitation services and electricity supply. As a result, there is a burgeoning market in private generators, though even this phenomenon is arguably linked to corruption: politicians are aligned with the generator suppliers, and thus, in fact, profit from government inaction. Furthermore, the absence of reform in the political system has created a weak tax collection mechanism, such that Lebanon’s tax revenues are at just 50 percent of their potential. The political instability and lack of reform ward off foreign investors from Lebanon, and over the last decades the country has dropped 40 places in the ease-of-doing-business ranking and is now ranked 143 in the world. External aid to Lebanon has dwindled in recent years, in part due to a reduction in remittances by Lebanese expatriates who in the past sent large sums of money to the motherland.
New difficulties have compounded these problems. The civil war in Syria has had a negative effect on Lebanon’s economy. Since 2011 there has been a reduction in agricultural exports to Syria as well as other markets that must be reached via Syria, including Iraq and Jordan. Furthermore, the war generated a severe refugee problem. In recent years, approximately one million refugees from Syria sought refuge in Lebanon, and their presence is a strain on the economy. In addition, the American sanctions on Iran indirectly harm Lebanon. The “maximum pressure” policy pursued by the US administration against Iran has harmed the Iranian economy and prompted a decline in Iranian aid to Hezbollah, heightening the motivation on the part of the organization to increase revenues derived from the privileges of political power, which means a cost to the Lebanese taxpayers.
Furthermore, the decline of the Iranian economy has caused a significant reduction in Lebanese exports to Iran over the last year. Beyond that, in the summer of 2019, as part of its policy against Iran, the US administration imposed direct sanctions on Lebanese terrorism figures and banks. The consequences of the sanctions compound those created by the cessation some years ago of investment by Saudi Arabia, which had enlisted to help Lebanon but now prefers not to invest there so long as key positions are filled by figures close to Iran. … [To read the full article, click the following LINK – Ed.]
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For Further Reference:
Nasrallah: Iran Rebuilt Lebanon After War, Soleimani’s Death ‘New Age’: Tzvi Joffre, Jerusalem Post, Jan. 12, 2020 — In a speech marking one week since the assassination of former IRGC Quds Force commander Qasem Soleimani, Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah thanked Iran and Soleimani for helping rebuild Lebanon after the Second Lebanon War against Israel in 2006.
Lebanon Reacts Following Nasrallah Speech: Nicholas Frakes, Al-Monitor, Jan. 11, 2020 — The sound of people chanting filled the air as supporters of the Iranian-backed Hezbollah movement expressed their anger toward the United States during a speech given by Lebanese Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah.
Hezbollah Moved Military Equipment Towards Israeli Border: IRGC: AMN, Jan. 9, 2020 — On Wednesday, the media wing of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) of Iran, cited by Sputnik Arabic, said that Lebanon’s Hezbollah has moved its military equipment towards the Lebanese border with Israel.
Tony Badran: Lebanon Protests Fueled by “Endemic Corruption” of Political Class: Middle East Forum Radio, Nov. 27, 2019 — On November 20, Middle East Forum Radio interviewed Tony Badran, a research fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, to discuss the ongoing mass protests in Lebanon.
Funding Lebanon is Funding Hezbollah: A.J. Caschetta, Jerusalem Post, Jan. 13, 2020 — December 2019 was a bizarre month in America’s nearly four-decade-long struggle with Hezbollah. It ended with the US embassy in Baghdad under attack by one form of Hezbollah angry at the deaths of their comrades killed in Iraq and Syria on December 29.
