Warriors of God (73 page)

But the army and police soon expanded their crackdown from car theft gangs to currency counterfeiters and hashish farmers. In late 2008, the army raided Noah's compound, forcing him to flee with his men into the surrounding hills. In early 2009, Lebanese troops ambushed
and shot dead a top member of the powerful Jaafar clan, sparking a reprisal attack in which four soldiers were killed.

Some of the tribes vowed to vote against Hezbollah in the parliamentary elections in June 2009 as punishment for permitting the crackdown in the first place. More broadly, the bitterness revived the old grievance that the modern Hezbollah was dominated by southerners and that the Bekaa warriors, those who had comprised the original cadres and leadership in 1983, were marginalized from decision-making levels.

In an attempt to mollify the angry clans, Nasrallah devoted a speech to the Bekaa fighters at the end of May, a week before the elections, in which he paid tribute to their sacrifices in the resistance and denounced the long-standing neglect of the region by the state.

Even in the more passive rural environment of south Lebanon, Hezbollah sometimes has to tread carefully in order not to upset local sentiment. In the buildup to the municipal elections in 2010, I heard of two Shia-populated Hezbollah-supporting villages in the south—and there may have been more—that rebelled at the imposition of a list of candidates presented by local Hezbollah men as a fait accompli. The village elders refused to accept the lists, compelling apologetic Hezbollah officials to hold a series of meetings to work out a compromise.

This perpetual delicate dance performed by Hezbollah to balance its obligations to Iran and to its Shia constituency in Lebanon was evident in the long-awaited update to its original 1985 Open Letter manifesto. The new manifesto, unveiled in December 2009, was an exercise in pragmatism and tact in which Hezbollah's unyielding worldview was tailored to conform to the prevailing political reality in Lebanon. Much of the thirty-two-page document covered familiar ground in articulating Hezbollah's resistance priority. The United States was cast as a hegemonic global bully, the origin of “every aspect of terrorism” and the “most loathsome nation in the world.” Israel was a “usurping fabricated entity” that “represents an eternal threat to Lebanon.”

However, the document was perhaps more notable for its omissions than for the topics included. Gone were the fiery rhetoric and zealous language of the 1985 original. Gone, too, was any reference to an Islamic
state in Lebanon and to the
wilayat al-faqih
, even though it remains the indissoluble thread that binds the party to Iran. Although Hezbollah's leaders long ago publicly acknowledged that the establishment of an Islamic state in Lebanon is a practical impossibility, given the country's pluralistic identity, it remains among its founding principles. Indeed, as an Islamist, jihadist organization, it would be anathema for Hezbollah to renounce the ambition of living in a state run by Sharia law. The new document even excluded any repetition of the 1985 manifesto's demand for the destruction of Israel as an ideological imperative.

During the presentation of the new manifesto, Nasrallah admitted that it was essentially a “political document” that did not touch on “matters of creed, ideology, or thought.” Hezbollah's view on the
wilayat al-faqih
, he added, “is not a political stand that can be subjected to revision.”

Hezbollah had been mulling an update to the Open Letter from as long ago as 2002. Sheikh Naim Qassem told me that year that the update was necessary because “much has happened and much has changed between 1985 and now. Our basic principles remain the same because they are at the heart of our movement, but many other positions have changed due to evolving circumstances around us.” He said that Hezbollah needed to be “flexible” and to adapt to the prevailing situation, but, he added, “the resistance against Israel has been our core belief and that has never changed.”

The “resistance” is Hezbollah's beating heart, its one immutable defining certainty. All the other components of the organization—the parliamentary presence, the social welfare networks that have helped entrench it within Lebanese society—exist essentially to support and sustain the resistance priority. Paradoxically, however, accommodation with and assimilation into Lebanese society bring new responsibilities and obligations that Hezbollah cannot disregard irrespective of its allegiance to the
wali al-faqih
.

Hezbollah's critics argue that the so-called “Lebanonization” process of the 1990s was nothing more than a chimera, a deceitful fig leaf masking the party's slavish obedience to the
wali al-faqih
and its role as the Lebanese detachment of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps. While there is some validity to the claim, it misses the point. Hezbollah had no choice but to “Lebanonize”—tactically, if not strategically—to accommodate to the post–civil war realities in Lebanon. It could not have survived into the 1990s if it had not done so.

Hezbollah may continue to adhere to its core ideological goals, including living under an Islamic regime in Lebanon, but the party has given considerable thought to a more pragmatic system of governance in keeping with the realities of a multiconfessional Lebanon. In its 2006 memorandum of understanding with Michel Aoun and in the updated manifesto of 2009, Hezbollah states that “consensual democracy” remains the “fundamental basis for governance” in Lebanon until the sectarian system can be abolished. Emphasizing a commitment to the Lebanese “homeland” and support for consensual democracy helps make Hezbollah more palatable to other sects, particularly the Christians, allowing the party to build alliances beyond the narrow confines of its core Shia constituency and thus better protecting its resistance priority. It also represents a potential new platform for Hezbollah if ever there is a region-shaping dynamic that fundamentally alters the Iran-Israel conflict paradigm, such as the conclusion of a comprehensive Middle East peace or the collapse of the Islamic Republic, which would compel the party to reassess its agenda in order to survive.

Still, one should be under no illusions that Hezbollah's public backing of consensual democracy and outreach to other sects represents a moderation of its ideological aspirations and agenda. After all, the legions of raw recruits who attend Hezbollah's religious classes and military training programs are not there to learn about consensual democracy and coexistence.

The seeming contradiction between Hezbollah's increasingly complex Lebanoncentric attitudes and its continued obligation to the Islamic Republic in part explains why there are such differing views held by academics, journalists, policy makers, and others who closely monitor
and analyze the party's actions and behavior. Some will lean more toward Hezbollah's evolving integration into the Lebanese milieu; others remain convinced that the party is little more than a ruthless tool of Iranian power projection. Hezbollah's identity today actually lies somewhere in between. Certainly, Hezbollah long ago outgrew the ragtag Iranian proxy militia status of its earliest years and is today the dominant political and military actor in Lebanon, a multi-billion-dollar corporation with commercial interests and pockets of influence spanning much of the globe. Iran has a clear understanding of Hezbollah's domestic realities and grants Nasrallah autonomy in matters related to Lebanese policy.

While Hezbollah usually plays down its logistical and military ties to Iran, it does not disguise its ideological commitment to the Islamic Republic and to the
wali al-faqih
even though such declarations provide grist to those who deride the organization as an Iranian puppet. In May 2008, Nasrallah mocked Hezbollah's opponents “who imagine they insult us when they call us the party of the
wilayat al-faqih.…
Absolutely not. Today I declare—and this is nothing new—that I am proud of being a member of the
wilayat al-faqih
party, the wise
faqih
, the scholar
faqih
, the courageous
faqih
, the truthful and sincere
faqih
.”

Hezbollah is Iran's only true success in exporting the Islamic revolution, and its continued viability is important to Iran on several levels. It allows the Islamic Republic to project influence directly into the confrontation against the Jewish state; and Hezbollah's martial successes against Israel over the years have helped burnish Iran's standing in the Middle East and ameliorate to some extent the historic suspicions Sunni Arabs hold for the Shia Persians. Most important, however, Hezbollah's military might today serves as a component of deterrence against the possibility of an attack by the West or Israel against Tehran's nascent nuclear facilities. After all—and there should be no misunderstanding here—the billions of dollars Iran has spent on Hezbollah since 2000 was not an altruistic gift to help Lebanon defend itself against the possibility of future Israeli aggression. If Iran was so concerned about Lebanon's territorial integrity, it could have directed its philanthropy into upgrading the Lebanese army on a transparent state-to-state basis. Instead,
through Hezbollah, Iran has established a bridgehead on Israel's northern border, enhancing its deterrence posture and expanding its retaliatory options in the event of an attack on the Islamic Republic.

Yet here again Hezbollah faces the quandary of balancing its obligations to Iran and meeting the needs of its Shia constituency in Lebanon. The Shias of Lebanon generally support Hezbollah as a resistance to regain Israeli-occupied Lebanese territory and to defend against the possibility of future Israeli aggression. But they would have little sympathy for Hezbollah if the organization were to plunge Lebanon into another war with Israel for the sake of protecting the nuclear ambitions of a country lying 650 miles to the east.

Hezbollah officials, in keeping with their customary ambiguity on such matters, decline to respond to specific questions on their expected course of action if Iran was attacked. Sheikh Naim Qassem once waved his hand dismissively and told me that Iran has plenty of retaliatory options without requiring Hezbollah's assistance. But he added that much depended on the circumstances of an attack on Iran—the identity of the attacking force, the scale of the assault, and whether it was limited just to the Islamic Republic. “We don't know what shape the Israeli aggression would take at that time and what areas it would include,” he said. “Would it be restricted to a limited strike on Iran or a large-scale one involving several countries? I can say that if it takes place from Israel, it is liable to ignite the whole region.”

Pondering Hezbollah's likely response is dependent on too many variables. But Iran must appreciate that Hezbollah is essentially a one-shot retaliatory option and therefore must be utilized wisely. If Iran is subjected to a limited attack, designed to set back the nuclear program a few months or years, that leaves the regime intact, would Iran really direct Hezbollah to respond by launching a cross-border offensive into Israel from Lebanon? Such a move would trigger the long-feared destructive war, the outcome of which is uncertain. Furthermore, there are no guarantees that Hezbollah would be in a position to rearm once more, as it did after the 2006 war, in readiness to counter a more ambitious attack on Iran.

On the other hand, if the United States and its allies launch a massive,
wide-ranging, and prolonged strike that is intended to destroy the nuclear program and cripple the regime in Tehran, then Iran may consider it has little left to lose by activating Hezbollah, rallying its allies in the region, and launching the apocalyptic “last war” with Israel.

To mark the tenth anniversary of Israel's withdrawal from south Lebanon, Hezbollah opened in May 2010 its old military base in the oak-tree-shrouded hillside at Mlita on the edge of what used to be the northern sector of the Israeli occupation zone. It was by far the most ambitious of Hezbollah's many exhibitions and events held to laud the resistance and promote the struggle against Israel. Thousands of visitors descended on the site in the first few weeks to gawp at symbolic displays of smashed tanks, armored vehicles, and jeeps and piles of old military helmets. One Merkava tank had its barrel twisted into a knot. Another tank had run up against a giant concrete wall inscribed with Imad Mughniyah's signature. A sandbagged walkway beneath trees led past numerous tableaux of dummy Hezbollah fighters in camouflage uniforms carrying Katyusha rockets or creeping through the undergrowth with rifles. One could even visit the alcove in the rocks where Sayyed Abbas Mussawi once prayed. His prayer mat, rifle, and copy of the Koran rested alongside a photograph of the slain Hezbollah leader. A recording of his gravelly voice reciting prayers wafted through the trees.

“Those of us who used to be based here in the 1980s when Sayyed Abbas was here begin to weep when they hear his voice in this place,” said Abu Hadi, the Hezbollah fighter who first met Mussawi at Mlita so many years earlier (as recounted in
chapter 2
) and today gives guided tours of the site.

Perhaps the highlight of the display is the tunnel-and-bunker system built in the 1980s, the prototype of those I explored in the border district after the 2006 war. A glassed-in “operations room” deep inside the bunker had military maps pinned to a wall and an old computer on the
desk. Recordings of fighters communicating by radio were played over loudspeakers.

A small landscaped garden on top of the hill was lined with tools of Hezbollah's trade: antitank missiles, including an AT-14 Kornet that had so bedeviled Israeli armor in 2006, and a variety of recoilless rifles and antiaircraft cannons, including the 57 mm gun that Hezbollah once fired across the border to alarm the residents of Galilee in response to the daily Israeli overflights in Lebanese airspace. From Mlita, one could gaze across a steep valley to the old Sojod compound just visible on the opposite side, once the most heavily hit outpost in the occupation zone.