Hizballah / Hizbollah / Hizbullah / Hezbollah
Party of God
Islamic Jihad
Islamic Jihad for the Liberation of Palestine
Organization of the Oppressed on Earth
Revolutionary Justice Organization
Hezbollah is more than just an organisation. It is an identity project that brings together Islam and resistance, both of which are intertwined with broader community thinking and Shia community narratives. Hizballah is an Islamic movement founded after the Israeli military seizure of Lebanon in 1982, which resulted in the formation of Islamic resistance units committed to the liberation of the occupied territories and the ejection of Israeli forces. Hizbollah was established in 1982 during the Lebanon War when a group of Lebanese Shi'ite Muslims declared themselves to be the "Party of God" (Hizb Allah, which is clear in Hizbollah but progressively less so in Hizbollah / Hizbullah / Hezbollah).
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called again for the disarmament of Lebanon's Hezbollah and the halting of its military interventions in neighboring Syria, in a semi-annual report released 03 May 2019. Noting that the new Lebanese government is making the economic situation its priority, Guterres stressed that “it is also important to look into (the) development of a national defense strategy.” He also said that the omnipresence of weapons beyond the control of the state, coupled with the existence of armed militias, continues to jeopardize Lebanon’s security and stability. “The fact that Hezbollah still has significant military assets beyond the control of the Lebanese State remains very worrying,” Guterres said.
The secretary-general also argued that Hezbollah’s commitment to the conflict in Syria risks “bogging Lebanon into regional conflicts and threatens its stability as well as that of the region.” Guterres said “I again call on Hezbollah and all other concerned parties to refrain from any military activity inside or outside the country, in accordance with the provisions of the Taif Agreement and resolution 1559”.
Israel fears Hezbollah’s growing strength and Iran’s growing influence as a threat to its regional hegemony — a concern shared by its Saudi and American counterparts — and will continue actions in Syria in an effort to counter what it sees as a growing Iranian presence next door. There will eventually be a showdown between Israel and Hezbollah. But the rules of the game have changed dramatically in Hizbollah’s favor since the two last fought. In the 2006 war, Hezbollah gave Israel a bloody nose but Lebanon was devastated in the process. In any future war, Hezbollah will be able to do far more damage to Israel. The organization is much stronger, far better armed and is able to carry out offensive maneuvers after gaining extensive battlefield experience against jihadists in Syria. Also, any future war with Israel might include the involvement of Hezbollah’s allies in Syria and Iraq, transforming what would otherwise be a local conflict into a regional one.
Upon the realization that the IDF was entrenching itself in south Lebanon, and influenced and assisted by 1,500 Iranian Revolutionary Guards in Lebanon, Hizballah cells began developing with the immediate desire to resist the Israeli invasion. Hizbollah began establishing its base in Lebanon in 1982 and has expanded and strengthened ever since, primarily due to its wave of suicide bombings and foreign support by Iran and Syria.
Hizballah fought alongside troops loyal to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. Hizballah said the war is necessary to protect Shi'ites from Sunni extremists who had been at the forefront of the Syrian opposition. Hizballah's deployment of fighters to Syria has increased the group's enemies beyond its traditional rival, Israel, to include Sunni extremists. The Syrian regime and Hizballah had a long military alliance, and Hizballah leaders had sought safe haven in Syria and even routed weapons from Iran into Lebanon. So the interplay between the Assad regime and Hizballah has been well chronicled.
In addition to the traditional Lebanese Hizballah, which had deployed fighters to Syria since 2011, Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) General Hossein Hamedani declared in May 2014 that Iran had formed "a second Hizballah in Syria." In early 2014, several Shiite militias in Syria began to call themselves, “Hezbollah fi Suriya,” or Hezbollah in Syria.
Lebanese Shi’ites doubted the wisdom of the involvement in Syria. When young Lebanese Shi’ite fighters started to return in body bags in 2014, some supporters, especially those in southern Lebanon, questioned why Hezbollah was fighting in Syria, arguing the real enemy is Israel. But a series of jihadist bombings in Shi’ite strongholds of Beirut and suicide bombings in the Bekaa Valley changed that — the critics fell back into line.
“The Islamic State has been a saving grace for Hezbollah’s recruitment efforts,” says Matthew Levitt, director of the Stein Program on Counterterrorism and Intelligence at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, and author of the book “Hezbollah: The Global Footprint of Lebanon's Party of God.” Until the bombings and the rise of the Islamic State, “there was a lot of backlash to Hezbollah,” he adds. “Hezbollah is seen as the only one capable of defending Shi’ites from the onslaught of the radical Sunnis.”
The Secretary-General of the Lebanese Hezbollah, Hassan Nasrallah, sparked a wave of controversy among Lebanese citizens after his statements February 19, 2024 in which he linked the assassination of Hezbollah leaders by Israel to violations resulting from the use of smart phones, calling on his supporters to “abandon cell phones.” Nasrallah said in a televised speech: “The cell phone is an eavesdropping device. Our brothers in the border villages and throughout the south, especially the fighters and their families, must dispense with their cell phones in order to preserve and protect the blood and dignity of the people. The cell phone is a deadly agent that provides specific and accurate information.”
Nasrallah added in his speech, “Most of the cases (assassinations) that occur are the result of cell phones... We are taking internal procedures. But it seems that the cell phone has turned into something like oxygen for people, and they cannot live without it.” He addressed his officers by saying: “You know that this is a listening device, and your voice, the voices of your wives, and what happens at home and work reach the Israelis. However, the officers remain clinging to cell phones.” Nasrallah continued in a firm tone: “This is not permissible from a legal standpoint, at a minimum, during the stage of fighting, battle, threat, and exposing the security and lives of others to death.”
Nasrallah's words reveal the extent of the violation that Hezbollah is exposed to in the confrontation it is waging from the southern Lebanese border with the Israeli army. It also reveals that technology, although in some places it constitutes a support tool for armed militias in the region, such as Hezbollah, the Houthis, and the Iraqi militias affiliated with Iran, through drones and some advanced technologies associated with them, in addition to guided and smart missiles, it is transforming, and because of superiority. The technical knowledge of the countries that these militias face indicates a fatal weakness in these groups, especially in terms of “catching” their leaders and military officials through precise injuries.
The Secretary-General of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad movement, Ziad Nakhalah, admitted in statements dating back to May 2023 (that is, before the October 7 attack) that the assassination of the movement’s leaders by Israeli raids “is not due to the enemy’s competence, but because of our behavior, which is not commensurate with the nature of our battle with the enemy.” . He continued: "Using a mobile phone is the most dangerous thing in our fighting and leads to our assassination."
This acknowledgment by Nakhalah is similar to Nasrallah’s admission in a public statement that the main breach that his party is suffering from is related to the breach of the smart phone network, and the ability to determine the movements of leaders or fighters by tracking the phones they carry, most of which are connected to the Internet service.
“Is the breach in the communications system and internal networks in Lebanon, or is the breach at the level of the cellular devices used by the Lebanese, including Hezbollah members? This is the basic question, according to communications expert Wassim Mansour, who previously held the position of general manager in the company.” Touch, one of the two mobile phone operators in Lebanon.
Mansour believes that the Lebanese networks have a firewall protection system, but he cannot confirm whether these systems are updated or not. He told "Raise Your Voice" that a breach of networks is possible, but what is more likely is a breach of the phones themselves, because these devices are connected to the Internet, which makes them highly vulnerable to hacking, especially since Israel possesses high technologies in analyzing the information coming from the phones, processing it, and acting on it. This is to carry out assassinations.
But the second question that comes up here is how did Israel obtain subscriber data to track specific phone numbers and monitor and track the movement of devices? Many Lebanese data are available on the Internet, and this makes obtaining them available, especially to parties that possess high technologies, as is the case with Israel.
These data are also confirmed by Abdel Qataya, Director of Media Programs at the SMEX organization for digital rights. He told “Raise Your Voice”: “The Israelis were able to obtain a huge amount of Lebanese data and are using artificial intelligence to analyze it and benefit from it militarily. There are many cases of documented data leakage, such as the presence of all the data of the Vehicle Registration Authority in its entirety through unlicensed public applications that violate the privacy of the Lebanese.” “Also, anyone can easily access the Internet and obtain voter data, with all its details.”
Qataya adds: “Years ago, it was discovered that an employee of two cell phone companies in Lebanon had spied with Israel and leaked the company’s data. We did not know what happened after that and whether measures had been imposed to protect the data and to understand the nature and extent of the breach.”
Mansour, in turn, explains to “Raise Your Voice” that what Israel essentially excels at is its ability to use artificial intelligence to analyze the data it obtains and thus interrupt it with other matters to identify targets and carry out assassination operations. This is in addition to Israel's possession of very advanced spyware, such as the "Pegasus" program, which is a program sold by an Israeli company to other systems and countries (as revealed by investigative investigations) and has the ability to hack, track, eavesdrop on smartphones, extract the data it contains, use its applications, the phone's camera, and record voices. Without the phone owner being able to know that it has been hacked.
This technology (Pegasus) allows the Israelis, according to Mansour, “to access any smart cellular device, regardless of the manufacturer and the quality of the device.”
Qataya, for his part, believes that “the Israelis are incredibly technologically advanced, with the ability to access data related to phones and computers connected to the Internet via optical fibers, in addition to the ability to penetrate communications that take place via the aerial or satellite Internet, and this includes what is called traffic (traffic) and all The data and applications used by the target phone, in addition to the ability to determine its geographical location.
These are all “logical” violations, according to Mansour, when users connect their phones to the Internet, allow applications to access and use phone data, as well as link the phone to location technology. As technology develops, the challenges related to privacy and security increase, and “if you are not technologically advanced to protect yourself from technology, then the only solution to protect yourself may be to abandon technology,” Mansour concludes.
|
NEWSLETTER
|
| Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list |
|
|
|
