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Hezbollah

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This article is about the Hezbollah based in Lebanon. For an article about the unrelated Hezbollah in Turkey, see Hezbollah (Turkey).

The neutrality of this article is disputed.

File:Hizb.jpg
Hizbollah militant
Guerrilla carrying Hezbollah Flag

Hezbollah (Arabic ‮حزب الله‬, meaning Party of God; also written as Hizbullah, Hizballah, Hizbollah, or Hizb Allah) is a militant Shia political party in Lebanon. Hezbollah began as a guerrilla group fighting against the Israeli occupation in southern Lebanon. It maintains an active militia, known as the Islamic Resistance. Since the Israeli withdrawal from Lebanon, the Islamic Resistance has skirmished with the Israel Defense Forces around Israeli-occupied Shebaa Farms (which Hezbollah considers Lebanese territory) and near the Lebanese-Israeli border many times.

In addition to its military wing, Hezbollah maintains a civilian arm, which runs hospitals, schools, orphanages, a television station and holds 12 seats in the Lebanese Parliament. Hezbollah is primarily active in the Bekaa Valley, the southern suburbs of Beirut, and southern Lebanon. The group is headed by "Sayed Hassan Nasrallah".

Hezbollah has been designated as a terrorist organization by the United States [1] the United Kingdom [2], Canada[3][4] and Australia[5]; the U.S. Department of State notes that Hezbollah has killed more than 300 American citizens (over 200 of whom were Marines in Lebanon.) The European Union has not listed Hezbollah, although some diplomats have suggested that it might do so in future[6]. Russia has only recently begun to draw up a list of organizations it classifies as terrorist, which may reflect that of the EU[7]. Some western media outlets sometimes associate the name 'Hezbollah' with 'terrorism', whereas other sources do not. Hezbollah itself has strongly denounced certain terrorist incidents - including the September 11 attacks[8] and the killing of Nick Berg[9], while at the same time actively supporting[10] the terrorist group Hamas (in violation of UN Security Council Resolution 1373), although it maintains that Hamas is not terrorist either. This claim stands in opposition to the fact that the US, UK, Canada, Australia and European Union all list Hamas as a terrorist organization. Hezbollah further claims that it has never committed any acts of terror. Instead, it justifies its violent actions as a response to Israeli actions.

As a result of its role in making Israel withdraw from southern Lebanon, Hezbollah has gained widespread respect there; the Christian President of Lebanon, Emile Lahoud, said: “For us Lebanese, and I can tell you a majority of Lebanese, Hezbollah is a national resistance movement. If it wasn't for them, we couldn't have liberated our land. And because of that, we have big esteem for the Hezbollah movement.”[11]

History

Hezbollah was formed from numerous other Lebanese Shia groups shortly after Israel's 1982 invasion of the mainly Shia southern part of Lebanon. Its organization was greatly aided by the arrival of 1,500 Revolutionary Guards from Iran, only three years after Iran's 1979 Islamic Revolution. Iran, as an Islamic republic -- especially a Shia one -- remains a close ally, influence, and model for Hezbollah.

Combat Operations

Prior to 2000

Hezbollah is known or suspected to have been involved in numerous attacks on American targets in Lebanon during the 1980's, including the suicide bombings of the U.S. Embassy, which killed 63 including 17 Americans, and of the US Marine barracks in Beirut (see Marine Barracks Bombing), which killed 241 American servicemen. The attack upon the United States embassy annex in Beirut in September 1984 killed 20 people including 2 Americans. American forces were at the time engaged in fighting against Hezbollah, both viewing the others party as the aggressor. Elements of the group have been linked to involvement in kidnapping, detention and torture of American and other Western hostages in Lebanon by groups such as Islamic Jihad who claimed the hostage-takings were in retaliation to the detentions without charge, trial or POW status of many Arabs at SLA prison and torture chamber Khiam, where many prisoners were apparently hostages (e.g. the families of suspected Hezbollah guerrillas may be detained). (Hezbollah has not accepted responsibility.)

Until the Israeli withdrawal from southern Lebanon, Hezbollah fought the IDF. Following the 1996 Grapes-of-Wrath agreement between the IDF and Hezbollah the conflict turned mostly low intensity, though the IDF still used tank shelling, helicopter missile fire in response to anti-tank missile attacks and Katyusha attacks on northern Israeli towns. Both sides mostly resorted to low intensity warfare tactics, including sniper fire, machine gunning, rocket fire, missiles and mortars. Both the IDF and Hezbollah developed commandos that specialized in warfare appropriate for the terrain of southern Lebanon.

While the war of attrition waged, 'normal' life still continued in south Lebanon. Hezbullah's mutually beneficial arrangements with the Lebanon Liaison Unit in Marjaoun, date from the earliest days culminating with the last Liaison Unit Commander-Brig. General Benny Gantz, who led the Liaison unit out of Lebanon during its military withdrawal in May 2000.

Hezbollah claims to have modeled their premier elite Unit 13 after the IDF Navy Commandos. Hezbollah claimed that a 1997 failed attack by IDF SEAL unit was ambushed by Unit 13, though the IDF claims that the attack failed when the SEALs stepped on a landmine, trigering the detonation of a charge they carried.

Hezbollah ambushes of IDF troops occurred on ocassion less than 100 meters from Israel's border. Difficulties in providing reinforcements and resupply by land in part due to Hezbollah's successful guerrilla attacks, the IDF took to the air and began using helicopters to resupply its troops in Lebanon.

Hezbollah AA units "Saladins Falcons" equipped with SA-7, SA-14, SA-18 and Stinger missiles caused IDF helicopters to switch tactics and fly high and use flares in order to avoid heat-seeking missiles. Not a single IDF helicopter or warplane was brought down by these 1970's vintage Soviet weapons. However, a collision of 2 IDF helicopters on 4 Feb. 1997, loaded with reinforcement troops and ammunition for the Sojod outpost caused the death of over 48 IDF soldiers. This incident tilted Israeli public opinion further in favor of a pullout from Lebanon.

Hezbollah recognized Unit 13 as the most successful in operations against the IDF.

On 10 June 1996 Hezbollah Unit 13 hunter-killer elements ambushed a patrol of IDF Paratrooper Recon and killed 5 soldiers. Hezbollah claimed that this successful ambush led to it greatly increasing their special forces capability.

Hezbollah claimed that various intelligence & documents, were sold by IDF officer Ashkinazi (versus his claim that his computer was stolen) provided the intelligence for an attack that killed IDF Colonel Erez Gerstein.

The IDF concentrated the remainder of 1999 until their withdrawal in May 2000 on Air Force operations and no longer carried out further passive patrolling operations.

Special actions of the Hezbollah Abu Ruhm Special Forces Unit against the Israeli sponsored South Lebanese Army mercenary forces resulted in blinding SLA by assassination of its key Security Services Intelligence assets and ably assisted by unceasing attacks on SLA by Hezbollah's Abu Burdah Special Forces Unit led to SLA's panicked surrender and IDF's hasty 24 hour withdrawal.

Aside from fighting the IDF in Lebanon Hezbollah may have been involved in international terrorism. In 1992 and 1994, Hezbollah is claimed to have carried out the Israeli Embassy Bombing and the AMIA Bombing in Buenos Aires, Argentina.

2000 and Later

In January 2000, Hezbollah assassinated the commander of the South Lebanon Army Western Brigade, Colonel Aql Hashem, at his home in the security zone.[12]

In May 22nd 2000, Israel withdrew from Lebanon to the UN-agreed Israeli border, and their pullout was certified by the UN as complete[13]. However, Hezbollah claims the Shebaa Farms area, which is still occupied by Israel, to be Lebanese territory, and on that basis has continued to attack Israel (For more details see: History of Lebanon.)

Hezbollah snatched the bodies of three IDF soldiers during an October 2000 attack in Shebaa Farms, and sought to obtain the release of 14 Lebanese prisoners, some of whom had been held since 1978. On January 25, 2004, Hezbollah and Israel agreed on a exchange of prisoners. The prisoner swap was carried out on January 29: 30 Lebanese and Arab prisoners, the remains of 60 Lebanese militants and civilians, 420 Palestinian prisoners, and maps showing Israeli mines in South Lebanon were exchanged for an Israeli businessman and army reserve colonel kidnapped in 2001 and the remains of the 3 IDF soldiers mentioned above.

Hezbollah has continued to shell the northern border region of Israel with mortars and Katyusha artillery rockets, inciting condemnation from the UN Secretary-General[14].

In 7 May 2004 a Hezbollah ambushed an IDF patrol near the Gladiola outpost on the Israeli side of the border resulting in 1 member killed, and 11 wounded.

Entrance in political arena

Today, Hezbollah is an active participant in the political life and processes of Lebanon, and its scope of operation is far beyond its initial militant one. In 1992, it participated in elections for the first time, winning 12 out of 128 seats in parliament. It won 10 seats in 1996, and now holds 8. Since the end of the Israeli occupation in southern Lebanon on May 22 2000, the Hezbollah has been involved in activities like building schools, clinics, hospitals and other needed services for their society.

Foreign relations

Hezbollah claims that it forbids its fighters entry into Iraq for any reason, and that no Hezbollah units or individual fighters have entered Iraq to support any Iraqi faction fighting America. However, on April 2, 2004, Muqtada al-Sadr announced his intention to form chapters of Hezbollah and Hamas in Iraq[15]. He is not known to have consulted Hezbollah or Hamas before making this statement.

Hezbollah has no known links to Al-Qaida. Though Hezbollah has a Shi'ite ideology, this does not exclude it from co-operation with Sunnite groups; but Al-Qaida and the Taliban (which are respectively a Wahhabi and a Deobandi group) have long histories of conflict with Shi'a groups and with Iran, Hezbollah's strongest backer.

Hezbollah is closely allied with Iran and has a complex relationship with Syria. Hezbollah is strongly anti-Zionist, anti-West, and anti-Israeli.

Although it is widely believed that Hafez al-Assad and Hezbollah were closely related, he managed to avoid international criticism. Bashar al-Assad, his son and successor, has been subjected to sanctions by the US due to (among other things) his continued support for Hezbollah.

Those who consider Hezbollah to be a terrorist organization consider its sponsors (in particular Iran, Syria, and Lebanon) to stand in violation of UN Security Council Resolution 1373. The UN has no official list of organizations to which Resolution 1373 applies[16]. Israel has lodged continuous complaints[17] about Hezbollah's actions. Israel has bombed several Syrian targets in retaliation for terror attacks by Islamic Jihad and Hezbollah that Israel claims were sponsored by Syria. An Israeli official said that those attacks are a "message to Syria to stop sponsoring terrorism". The USA has imposed economic sanctions on Syria for their suppport of terrorism.

Canadian list of alternate names

Hezbollah is also known as Islamic Jihad (Islamic Holy War), Islamic Jihad Organization, Islamic Jihad for the Liberation of Palestine, Ansar al-Allah (Followers of God), Al-Muqawamah al-Islamiyyah (Islamic Resistance), Organization of the Oppressed, Organization of the Oppressed on Earth, Revolutionary Justice Organization, Organization of Right Against Wrong, and Followers of the Prophet Muhammed). [source: Canada's United Nations Suppression of Terrorism Regulations (SCHEDULE 1), SOR/2001-360, Registration: 2 October, 2001][18]

Ideology

Hezbollah views an Islamic republic on the Iranian model as the most desirable form of governance. However, it sees this republic as emerging from the consent of the vast majority, and, as Lebanon is a multi-religious state, this could not happen in the near future.

The organization holds an Islamic republic as the ideal and eventual form of state. However, as their conception of an Islamic republic requires the consent of the people, and Lebanon remains a religiously and ideologically heterogeneous society, their political platform revolves around more mundane issues. According to their published political platform in 2003, Hezbollah favors the introduction of an Islamic government in Lebanon by peaceful democratic means. According to the United States Department of State and reports submitted to Defense Technical Information Center (among other United States agencies) as late as 2001, the organization is seeking to create an fundamentalist Iranian-style Islamic republic and removal of all non-Islamic influences.

Hezbollah supports the destruction of the state of Israel[19] and co-operates with other militant Islamic organizations such as Hamas in order to promote this goal.

Media operations

Hezbollah operates a satellite television station from Lebanon, Al-Manar TV ("the Lighthouse") as well as a radio station, al-Nour ("the light"). Qubth Ut Alla ("The Fist of God") is the monthly magazine of Hezbollah's paramilitary wing.

See also

Anti-Israel movements | Arab-Israeli conflict | Axis of evil | Council on American-Islamic Relations | Foreign relations of Iran | Foreign relations of Lebanon | History of Lebanon | Imad Mugniyah  | Islam | Islam as a political movement | Islamic Terrorism | Islamism | Katyusha | List of terrorist groups | Politics of Lebanon | Qassam rocket | Special Force (computer game) | War on Terrorism | William Francis Buckley

External links, Resources, and References

Official site

United States Department of State

see also: United States Department of State

Information

Specific attacks

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