How Hamas Views Hezbollah’s Level of Participation in the War

By Imad Marmal | Al-Jamhouriya Newspaper
 
How does Hamas view Hezbollah’s pattern of involvement in the war across the southern front? Are there any differences in approach to the level of required participation, or are they on the same page?
 
During the early stages of the “Israeli” aggression against the Gaza Strip, some of the more enthusiastic Hamas leaders, especially those outside the occupied territories, may have expected Hezbollah to get fully involved in the confrontation. As such, some eagerly awaited a major escalation along the southern front and an overnight announcement of a great war.
 
But Hezbollah avoided heading in this irreversible direction after losing the element of surprise, which was the main reason behind the brilliant success of the Al-Aqsa Flood operation on October 7. However, this very same factor led to the awakening of the enemy and a full alert on the northern front with Lebanon, which complicated calculations and offensive plans.
 
In light of the new facts on the day after October 7, Hezbollah, which wasn’t satisfied with mere verbal solidarity with Gaza, invented a deliberate battle against the “Israelis” on the southern border. On the one hand, this is meant to exhaust and occupy a large portion of the “Israeli” military, and on the other, prevent Lebanon from sliding into an all-out war. That is unless the “Israeli” entity provokes a full-scale war through miscalculations, in which case the party will demonstrate its readiness.

As time passed and the results of this strategy began to appear, the level of satisfaction and reassurance rose among the Hamas leadership. The military spokesman for the Al-Qassam Brigades, Abu Ubaida, and the head of the Political Bureau, Ismail Haniyeh, recently expressed their gratitude to the resistance in Lebanon. This put an end to attempts by some who were fishing in murky waters.
 
A source in the Hamas leadership confirms that what Hezbollah is doing on the southern border with occupied Palestine, in terms of supporting the people of Gaza and its resistance, as well as defending Lebanon in the face of “Israeli” attacks, is “appreciated by us.” According to the Hamas source, the party has drawn up a model equation on the border compatible with the requirements of the current stage of the battle.
 
The source points out that the direction taken by the confrontation coupled with the steadfastness of the Hamas movement and all the Palestinian resistance factions do not necessarily require Hezbollah to launch an all-out war at the moment. Instead, it’s important not to let things crumble under the weight of emotion. 

“Any comprehensive confrontation must fall within the framework of a decisive war, not just a battle between wars,” the source added. “We do not deal with Hezbollah as if it were the ‘other’. Rather, when we meet, we assess a common position on the basis that we are one in the confrontation and not two parties.”
 
The Hamas leader stresses that Hezbollah is “sincere and serious in its support for us. Otherwise, it wouldn’t have this number of martyrs on the road to Al-Quds, including those in leadership positions and the son of a member of the Shura Council and the head of the Loyalty to the Resistance bloc. If the party had wanted to act selfishly because of its affiliation, it would not have intervened in the first place. However, it has proven again that it is as committed to the Palestinian cause as its owners.”
 
“It is not true that the resistance axis did not come to Gaza’s aid and that the ‘unity of the arenas’ was not achieved to a certain extent,” the leader said, pointing out that Hezbollah fought alone in 2006 while Hamas fought alone in 2014.
 
“In this confrontation, there is real coordination between the Axis’s arenas for the first time in this way, through the launch of the battle of the southern front, the Iraqi resistance carrying out operations against American sites in Syria and Iraq, and Ansarullah in Yemen launching attacks with missiles and drones and seizing ships in Bab al-Mandab, in addition to unprecedented Iranian diplomatic action in the region. This was evident during the regional diplomatic tour by Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir Abdollahian in support of the Axis of Resistance. It acted as a counterbalance to the visits by US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken in support of the ‘Israeli’ entity politically and militarily.”
 
The Hamas official points out that “we do not care about those who bet on the resistance out of narrow political interests, and we are not prepared to engage in discussions with them. As for those who are truly honest and who were expecting more from the party because of the real hopes they place on it, they must know that it has not fallen short in accordance with what the course of the confrontation has required so far.”