Since unrest in Syria began two years ago, support given to the Syrian regime by the Shiite Islamist movement Hezbollah to quash the insurrection by providing manpower, materials and logistical support, has frequently been discussed. Although clear and unequivocal, this aid had never been officially recognized before. However, Hezbollah’s leader, Hassan Nasrallah’s declarations some weeks ago have confirmed the movement’s support and direct participation in the conflict in favour of the Syrian Regime, though, in his words it is for defensive purposes.
Reset DOC, June 10, 2013.
Indeed, this would allow Hezbollah defend the Sayda Zeinab sanctuary in Damascus[1], aided by Iranian militia, Iraqi Shiites and Lebanese Shia villages that remained on Syrian territory after the border division between the two countries. Nasrallah also expressed his gratitude to Bashar Al-Assad and the Syrian regime, his ongoing backing of the resistance movement and his fight against its enemies. The Battle of Qusair, where it is believed that over one hundred Islamist militia fighters lost their lives, is the latest demonstration of Hezbollah’s direct involvement in the conflict.
Hezbollah is a complex organisation operating in all social areas. Since its birth it has evolved to differentiate and multiply its actions across different spectrums. Thus, Hezbollah has been able to participate in a delegation that visited the Syrian leader a few weeks ago, showing its support of the regime alongside Armenian, Christian or Pan-Arab organizations. It can make proposals to destroy the Lebanese religious system, remain staunchly silent on civil matrimony in the cedar country[2], or, own schools competing with Christian schools in terms of structure and formation. My article suggests a long-term analysis, from the onset of relations between Shiite movements in Lebanon up to Hezbollah’s actions in the region in the context of the Syrian crisis.
Relations between the two sides are not linear, rigid or monolithic. It is for this region that they should be considered in the long-term and not as an alliance that has remained unchanged since the movement’s official inauguration in 1985. To understand this relationship and alliance, one must analyse changes in the Lebanese Shiite community from the Seventies, as well as changes in the Syrian regime and the organizations’ particular characteristics. The relationship between the Baathist regime and the Shiite community goes back to the Seventies. Hafez Al-Assad was on friendly terms with Imam Musa Sadr[3], who formally declared the Alawites’ adherence to Shiism and therefore to the great Muslim family, legitimising the community in Syria in 1973. In the second half of the Seventies, several fundamental facts occurred to better understand the intensification of Syrian regime’s interest in the Shiite community: the Lebanese civil war and politicization of the community, the Islamic revolution in Iran, the conflict between the Syrian regime and various Islamist groups, which led to the massacre of Hama, and the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1982.
While Syria developed a closer relationship with the Amal movement[4], Iran began to invest in Hezbollah – a new movement and party – economically, politically and logistically. Even though it was unofficially founded in 1985, small-armed radical groups that readopted Khomeini’s ideas were already operating in Syria since 1982. In contrast to Amal, Hezbollah had a maximalist stance and aspired to create an Islamist state in the image of Khomeini’s Iran. However, the 1989 Taef Agreements, destined to end the Lebanese civil war[5] integrated the party into the cedar country’s political game. Starting from the 1992 elections, Hezbollah began to hold ministers, deputies in parliament and a greater influence on the socio-political life of the country. This was also thanks to the construction of hospitals and a network of schools knows as “Mustapha” schools.
In the meantime, Hezbollah preserved its militia, the only exception from the end of the civil war in 1990 – all other groups involved in the civil war officially accepted to depose their weapons. Given that Israel continued to occupy a good part of Southern Lebanon, this militia was not considered as such but rather as a resistance movement. Although the Israeli State’s army retired from Lebanon in the year 2000, Hezbollah’s armed force continues to exist. The Shebaa Farms are still occupied by Israel today and for the Party of God this justifies the continuation of its armed wing’s operations[6].
On its side, Syria has had an alliance with Iran for over 30 years. Initially based on security due to the war between Iran and Iraq in which Syria was allied to Iran and the Israeli invasion of Lebanon, this relationship evolved taking on economic and religious connotations. Hezbollah played an important role: for both countries the Shiite movement is an organization that is capable of exercising pressure on Israel. For Iran it represents the possibility to constantly maintain a foot in the Arab Levant; for Syria it constitutes the most faithful ally after it’s expulsion from Lebanon in 2005.
Bashar Al-Assad’s rise to power has brought about a strengthening of relations between Syria and Hezbollah. Several factors can account for this: a greater identification between the two young leaders, Bashar Al-Assad and Hassan Nasrallah; less pressure on Hezbollah’s decisions and organisational affairs on behalf of the Syrian regime; and an international context tainted by September 11, by the US invasion of Iraq, by Rafiq Hariri’s assassination in 2005 and by the war between the Shiite movement and Israel in 2006. It can be observed that, starting from 2005/06 politicians from both sides have shared greater coordination on aspects of internal politics in Lebanon. For example, Hezbollah’s support of Syrian presence and of its policies in the Cedar country through the formation of the pro-Syrian movement of March 8 [7] and mutual logistical and military support attests to this. The latter aspect has become clear in occasion of Israel’s attack in 2006 and the subsequent outbreak of the revolution and civil war in Syria.
Hezbollah’s support to Syria has become obvious from every angle, in particular the defensive one evoked by Nasrallah in his speeches. The Lebanese leader knows that the fall of the Baathist movement will most probably bring about the establishment of a new power close to Western countries and Gulf monarchies, and therefore less inclined to maintain the same relations of mutual support between both sides. At the same time, the Sunni community, and in particular the Hariri clan would question the exception of the party’s militia inside the country. In fact, soon after Hassan Nasrallah’s declarations, Saad Hariri, son of Rafiq Hariri and leader of the Future Movement Party, member of the anti-Syrian and anti-Hezbollah 8 March alliance, declared that Hezbollah’s participation in the conflict represents the Party of God’s death certificate as a resistance movement. And, yet again, four hours after the diffusion of Hezbollah’s leader’s words, two missiles have hit Dahye, Beirut’s Shiite neighbourhood provoking four injuries.
However, it is also necessary to understand Hezbollah’s politics from an organizational perspective: a pyramidal structure with an inexorable and indisputable leadership for the past twenty years that has evolved and differentiated itself in all social fields. As an organization Hezbollah therefore preserves an internal rationality that renders it flexible precisely where its resistance function has to be constantly proven, internally: the incessant exaltation of martyrdom and of its own “martyrs” in neighbourhoods and cities controlled by the movement, the fight against Israel and US power. This is so despite its differentiation and actions in areas far from its roots and, its external image as an indestructible militia that has been capable of defeating Israel on several occasions.
Ultimately, Hezbollah possesses a relatively flexible ideology that adapts to changes in internal and external Lebanese politics. Nevertheless, since its participation in the Syrian conflict was admitted in the past few weeks this flexibility as an organization has vanished. Is there a limit to the flexibility so typical to these types of organizations? Despite its differentiation and actions spanning multiple social fields, when it’s original function or raison d’être is threatened, the organization feels obliged to defend this stance if it wants to preserve and reproduce. In a context of regional penetration and threat of a possible transition to a new pro-Western and pro-Gulf Sunni Syria, the organization’s rationality involves defending that which is perceived as functional to its survival: the Syrian regime in spite of all differences. Hassan Nasrallah therefore spoke the truth: Hezbollah defends its own survival on the territory whether it wants to or not. Nasrallah is well aware that Hezbollah’s future will be played out in Damascus.
Agustin Galli is a researcher based in Beirut, Lebanon and a Phd candidate at Sciences Po Grenoble, France
Footnotes
[1]Daughter of Imam Ali, Sayda Zeinab was buried in an Iranian style mosque in the suburbs of Damascus. The neighbourhood is inhabited by Iraqi Shiite refugees and continuously gathers Iranian tourists on pilgrimage.
[2]Civil matrimony does not exist in Lebanon. In recent years, following the request of a mixed Shia-Sunni couple in favour of the approval of civil matrimony, a debate has begun in the country.
[3]Musa Sadr came from a religious and intellectual Shiite family that were spread throughout several Arab countries. He disappeared during a visit to Libya in 1978. Suspicions immediately fell on the Ghedaffi regime but even after its fall no light was shed on the Imam’s disappearance.
[4]The Amal movement (“hope” in Arabic and acronym of “ Lebanese Resistance Regiments”) founded by Musa Sadr in 1975 is the other Shiia party and movement in Lebanon. Nabih Berri, secular Shiite lawyer and president of the Lebanese parliament, has led it since the 1980’s. Its militia was disbanded in the Nineties.
[5]The Taef Agreements, signed by various Lebanese parties and political groups ended the civil war, disarming all militias, except Hezbollah, giving Syria the power to control the country’s political scene.
[6]Shebaa Farms refers to an area of about 40 square kilometres disputed between Syria, Lebanon and Israel. The latter considers it as part of the Golan, which was occupied by Israel in the Arab-Israeli War of 1967. Lebanon claims it as part of its own territory, while Syria maintains an ambiguous stance on this point.
[7]The March 8th movement is an alliance between several different Lebanese political parties, the two most important of which are Hezbollah and the Free Patriotic Movement, led by Michel Aoun, ex Lebanese general exiled in France between 1990 and 2005 and previously enemy to the Syrian regime.
Translated by Maria Elena Bottigliero
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