While still in Gaza, Israel has no good options in Lebanon. But it may invade anyway
The IDF and the home front are weary, and a military offensive against Hezbollah won’t defeat the terror organization. The success of the pager operation could offer a way out
Lazar Berman is The Times of Israel's diplomatic reporter
Even before thousands of pagers exploded in the pockets and hands of Hezbollah fighters on Tuesday, a major escalation between Israel and the Iran-backed Shiite army in Lebanon was looking increasingly likely.
After US special envoy Amos Hochstein met with Israel’s war leadership in Tel Aviv the day before, the security cabinet updated its official goals for the ongoing war with Hamas in Gaza to include allowing residents of the north to return safely home after being evacuated over concerns Hezbollah could launch a cross-border attack similar to October 7.
“Israel will continue to act to achieve this goal,” said a statement from the Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office, hinting strongly at the possibility of expanding military operations to get Hezbollah to stop firing.
Gallant was even more direct in his message to Hochstein, telling him that “the only way left to ensure the return of Israel’s northern communities to their homes will be via military action.”
Israeli media has been full of reports recently that the Israel Defense Forces is readying for an operation in the north, and military divisions have prepared plans for the use of ground forces in southern Lebanon.
If indeed Netanyahu does decide to take the initiative against Hezbollah, however, there is no guarantee he will achieve the desired effect. Moreover, it will make it far less likely that Israel will achieve its other three war aims — toppling Hamas, freeing the hostage and ensuring that Israel is not threatened from Gaza in the future — in the south.
Back to Lebanon
Israel has several options for a military campaign in Lebanon.
It can carry out an aerial offensive, either against the Lebanese state or only targeting Hezbollah.
Attacking Lebanon’s state infrastructure would mark a continuation of traditional Israeli approaches to non-state enemies, pressuring state actors to rein in terrorists within their borders. This approach was employed effectively against Egypt and Jordan to stop Palestinian Fedayeen attacks from their territory in the 1950s and 1960s. Until the Assad regime withdrew its troops in 2005, Israel also sought to use Syria, the strongest player in Lebanon, to stop attacks from the PLO and then Hezbollah on northern Israel and the IDF.
But this approach assumes that either the weak Lebanese state will act to rein in Hezbollah, or that public criticism will force the Shi’ite group to agree to a ceasefire. Such approaches failed in the past, and given the dysfunction and economic collapse in Lebanon, are no more likely to work today.
A campaign against Hezbollah itself that employs aircraft and artillery would meanwhile be a continuation of three decades of indecisive Israeli military operations. Israel has relied on airpower in an effort to deter Hezbollah and Hamas from attacking it, instead of looking for a decisive victory on the ground. Hamas’s October 7 onslaught underlined how badly that approach failed.
Alternatively, Israel could adopt the current approach to Gaza in the north by flooding Lebanon with ground forces, then slowly root Hezbollah out of villages and tunnels, while searching for weapons stockpiles. But the IDF hasn’t finished the job against the much smaller Hamas enemy, and managed to hold large numbers of reservists for only a few months before their patience cracked.
A longer, more deadly war in Lebanon with a tired reserve force and home front will only add to growing frustrations over the management of the conflict since October 7. It will also bring months of rocket attacks on a weary society with tens of thousands of internal refugees, a stagnant economy, and family members at war for almost a year.
Moreover, putting IDF forces back in southern Lebanon for months — if not years — provides an opening for the defending guerrilla force to bleed the conventional occupying army until it flees.
The final option is a limited ground incursion to create some sort of buffer zone in southern Lebanon. Northern Command chief Ori Gordin has been floating this idea, according to Israel Hayom, pointing at the flight of Lebanese civilians and Hezbollah Radwan fighters from the border. It could also serve as a bargaining chip to force Hezbollah to agree to a diplomatic solution.
Buffer zones haven’t been especially effective for Israel, however.
“There was a buffer zone from Operation Litani in 1978 until 1982,” said Tal Tovy, military historian at Bar Ilan University. “There were still infiltrations from Lebanon into Israel, and they fired more rockets from further away.”
“If the IDF creates a security zone of 5 kilometers, let’s say, then Hezbollah will just increase its short-range rocket fire.”
Israel would likely have to keep expanding the limited buffer zone until it finds itself restoring the security zone that it left in 2000.
Any operation that doesn’t badly damage Hezbollah and force it to redeploy far from the border will likely end with another ceasefire agreement, as past operations have. Would residents of the north who have no intention of returning home with Hezbollah on the border despite UN Security Council 1701 feel more secure if a war ends with a renewed UN resolution?
Neglect
Israel finds itself in a bind of its own making.
For years, it neglected its ground forces and bought into a theory of victory from the air coupled with defensive technologies like Iron Dome and multi-billion dollar fences. That approach allowed Hamas and Hezbollah to grow from a group of small terror cells to armies capable of invading Israel and shutting down its home front.
It also limits Israel’s options today. The limited availability of ground formations slowed the operation in Gaza, which leaves the country with the possibility of fighting two complex wars simultaneously.
“There is no realistic option for a decisive victory against Hezbollah as of September 2024,” said military theorist Eran Ortal.
Five years ago, then-IDF chief of staff Aviv Kohavi brought the top military brass together for a “Victory Workshop” to lay the groundwork for the army’s next multi-year plan. The IDF leadership came out of the self-examination workshop with some worrying conclusions.
The complete military superiority that the IDF enjoyed for three decades was eroding. Hamas and Hezbollah now possess capabilities associated with state militaries.
Kohavi laid out the challenge maneuvering IDF forces would face against these terror armies: “[They] are located in the heart of urban areas in a decentralized manner, which makes it very difficult to locate and destroy them, and allows the enemy to attack Israel’s home front effectively over time.”
Recognizing the urgent need for change, Kohavi called for increased lethality for the ground forces, better interconnectedness between pilots, infantry, tanks and drones, and better battlefield sensors to locate the enemy first.
Those capabilities were only partially introduced into the ground forces by the time Hamas-led terrorists invaded Israel on October 7.
Moreover, through 11 months of war, the IDF has been burning through stockpiles of shells, precision bombs and Iron Dome interceptor missiles.
“Israel should bide its time and develop its capabilities until it can fight a decisive war,” urged Ortal. “If we go into Lebanon now, we’ll have to do it again in another couple of years. Better not to do it twice.”
Saving Hamas
Israel’s conundrum in the north is rendered even more vexing given the pace of its campaign in Gaza. Blame can be placed both on the military leadership and on the prime minister, but the fact remains that 11 months after the worst slaughter of Jews since the Holocaust, the terror organization that perpetrated the attack remains capable of retaking the Gaza Strip and rebuilding its army whenever Israel withdraws.
Because Israel hasn’t found a way to declare an end to the war in Gaza — through a hostage deal or battlefield victory — Israel is left with few options beyond escalation in the north.
If Israel does decide on a ground operation against Hezbollah, a deal or decisive move against Hamas becomes even less likely as more troops are shifted to the north.
This would be an affirmation of Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar’s strategy, one that has failed him to this point. He expected Israel’s enemies to rise up against it and keep the IDF from crushing Hamas. That has not happened, but a war against Hezbollah could be the development that he has been waiting for underneath a ruined Gaza.
That doesn’t mean it would be a victory for Hezbollah, however. It started firing at Israel on October 8 to show solidarity with Hamas, not to spark a concerted assault by the IDF. Even before the pagers attack, Israel had killed over 400 of its fighters and taken out key infrastructure along the border. As a military source in Lebanon told a local news outlet, its show of support for Hamas is turning into an existential war for Hezbollah.
A way out of this quandary might have been created by the daring and creative beeper operation. If Israel were responsible, it would show how deeply Israeli intelligence has penetrated the secretive Hezbollah organization. Its leaders, unnerved by the very public blow they suffered on Tuesday, could decide that they have poked the tiger for too long, and now that it looks ready to pounce they’ll look to Hochstein to find a way to back off.
If that does happen, Israel’s war leadership would be well served to do what it needs to to bring the war on Hamas to a rapid conclusion, so it can start preparing for the inevitable campaign against Hezbollah, and initiate it only once it has designed its military to win.
