https://www.jns.org/hezbollah-no-longer-strategic-threat-but-israeli-determination-key/
Badly battered by Israel’s military operation in Lebanon, Hezbollah has been beaten, but not eliminated, analysts tell JNS. They paint an optimistic picture, saying that Hezbollah’s days as a strategic threat to Israel are over.
Within 24 hours of Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel’s south, the Shi’ite militia launched a rocket strike on the Jewish state. Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah said the group’s goal was to stretch Israel’s resources and force it to fight on two fronts.
Seeking to avoid that scenario, Israel played defense for nearly a year as Hezbollah fired more than 10,000 missiles from Lebanon, forcing 60,000 Israelis to flee their homes in the north for temporary shelter elsewhere. (Residents are expected to return in early March.)
Israel finally struck back in a series of remarkable operations starting on Sept. 17 and 18, 2024, detonating explosives hidden in pagers and walkie-talkies used by the Iranian-backed terror group. On Sept. 27, Israeli airstrikes killed Nasrallah. On Oct. 1, Israel invaded Lebanon, laying waste to much of Hezbollah’s terrorist infrastructure.
“Hezbollah has been hit dramatically. Its leadership has been toppled, its command structure decimated. Seventy percent of its strategic capabilities have been destroyed,” IDF Brig. Gen. (res.) Amir Avivi told JNS.
Hezbollah had been a serious threat, but in two weeks Israel brought it to its knees, he said. Hezbollah was further weakened when Sunni Islamists took over Syria, depriving Hezbollah of a major resupply route from Iran.