![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/https:\/\/d1e00ek4ebabms.cloudfront.net\/production\/49d0088b-23f6-4109-92b0-54fa2abab9d6.jpg\")
Mourners at Haytham Ali Tabatabai\u2019s funeral on Monday. Four other people were killed in the Israeli strike on the suburb of Dahiyeh \u00a9 Adri Salido\/Getty Images<\/p>\nOver the past year, Lebanese militant group Hizbollah has passively absorbed blow after blow as near daily Israeli air strikes pick off its operatives, destroy its remaining infrastructure and intimidate its base.<\/p>\n
But the assassination on Sunday in a busy Beirut neighbourhood of the group\u2019s top military commander Haytham Ali Tabatabai \u2014 the most senior figure killed since a US-backed ceasefire formally ended the Israel-Hizbollah war a year ago \u2014 raised the stakes to a new level.<\/p>\n
For Hizbollah\u2019s supporters the killing, seen as further confirmation that Israel has continued the war in all but name, raised an urgent question: how much longer can the Shia militant group hold back?<\/p>\n
\u201cHizbollah is facing a paralysing dilemma right now,\u201d said one official who regularly speaks to the militant group. \u201cDoes it continue to keep its head down and quietly rebuild?\u2009.\u2009.\u2009.\u2009Or does it retaliate against Israel and risk dragging Lebanon back into a more brutal war that could threaten to annihilate both them and the country?\u201d<\/p>\n
Long viewed as Lebanon\u2019s dominant military and political power and the crown jewel in Iran\u2019s network of regional proxy forces, Hizbollah\u2019s strength has waned since the conflict, which began after the group started firing into Israel after Hamas\u2019s October 7, 2023 attack.<\/p>\n
Many, both inside and outside the group, now see this as a fatal, strategic error \u2014 one that left it in disarray and vulnerable to domestic and international pressures.<\/p>\n
Mourners at Haytham Ali Tabatabai\u2019s funeral on Monday. Four other people were killed in the Israeli strike on the suburb of Dahiyeh \u00a9 Adri Salido\/Getty Images<\/p>\n
After Israel escalated tit-for-tat cross-border attacks into a full blown war, it assassinated its longtime leader Hassan Nasrallah, launched a ground invasion, and a bombing campaign devastated the Shia communities in its heartland, killing thousands.<\/p>\n
Under the terms of the ceasefire, Hizbollah agreed to move its weapons out of its bastion in southern Lebanon, with Israel agreeing to the phased withdrawal of its troops from the area. <\/p>\n
However, while Israel, the US and the new Lebanese government expect the militants to disarm as part of the agreement, Hizbollah has never expressly agreed to it. <\/p>\n
Lebanese officials have touted progress in dismantling Hizbollah infrastructure and weapons caches in the south, with the group\u2019s tacit co-operation. But the militants argue that their weapons remain necessary as long as Israel continues its aggression. <\/p>\n
Analysts and people familiar with the group\u2019s thinking said it has relied instead on a doctrine of \u201cstrategic patience\u201d, and has prioritised quietly reconstituting itself, filling senior positions left vacant by last year\u2019s assassinations and bolstering militarily.<\/p>\n
Though its supply routes were largely cut after the fall of Syria\u2019s Assad regime last year, several trucks full of rockets have in recent months been intercepted crossing into Lebanon from Syria.<\/p>\n
Israel, meanwhile, continues to occupy five \u201cstrategic\u201d outposts in southern Lebanon, preventing residents from returning and rebuilding what remains of their homes.<\/p>\n
It has repeatedly insisted that it will act unilaterally to target the militant group against any perceived threats, claiming to have killed more than 300 Hizbollah operatives since the ceasefire. The attacks have killed at least 127 civilians, according to the UN.<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/https:\/\/d1e00ek4ebabms.cloudfront.net\/production\/5ab3f1b5-b736-423b-9058-152b40bde0d2.jpg\")
Lebanese army soldiers secure the site of an Israeli air strike that targeted a building in the southern Lebanese village of Deir Kifa last week \u00a9 Mahmoud Zayyat\/AFP\/Getty Images<\/p>\n
The latest uptick in strikes has raised fears that Israel could be planning a larger assault, one that would risk reigniting the war.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cHizbollah is rebuilding its capabilities at a faster pace than the Lebanese army is able to reduce them. That\u2019s why we are striking and increasing the pace of enforcement,\u201d Nadav Shoshani, an IDF spokesperson, said.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe cannot allow such a situation, and we learned very well from the events of October 7 \u2014 we will not allow Hizbollah to pose a threat to us again.\u201d<\/p>\n
The stand-off has created an intractable problem for Lebanese authorities, who say Israel has refused to engage with offers to negotiate directly and fear that trying to force Hizbollah to disarm risks triggering civil strife.<\/p>\n
\u201cOver the past year, their focus, and Iran\u2019s focus, has been on rebuilding Hizbollah\u2019s military capabilities,\u201d said Nicholas Blanford, an expert on the armed group at the Atlantic Council think-tank.<\/p>\n
But its doctrine of patience \u201ccould snap\u201d, Blanford said, with some officials publicly saying Tabatabai\u2019s assassination \u201ccrossed a red line\u201d.<\/p>\n
While some analysts and people familiar with the group\u2019s thinking see that as typical Hizbollah bluster, others see a deepening divide over their future direction.<\/p>\n
\u201cSince the war ended, there have been internal divisions with some in the political leadership doubting the assessments of Hizbollah\u2019s military branch,\u201d said Mohanad Hage Ali, a senior research fellow at Carnegie. \u201cIn the past, the military commanders were telling the leadership that they\u2019re capable of deterring Israel \u2014\u00a0that was all proven terribly wrong.\u201d<\/p>\n
That discord is creating yet more internal divisions, that could push Hizbollah towards retaliation, Hage Ali said.<\/p>\n
Hizbollah\u2019s Iranian sponsors are also grappling with what role the group will play in a post-October 7 regional order. While its deterrence factor has been shattered, \u201cclearly the Iranians see the utility in rebuilding Hizbollah\u201d, Blanford said.<\/p>\n
\u201cIran doesn\u2019t have a firm plan for what they want to do with Hizbollah yet \u2014\u00a0maybe they\u2019ll be useful for staging another range of attacks on Israel in a future confrontation. But until they have decided, there\u2019s no reason not to rebuild an asset that could still prove itself useful.\u201d<\/p>\n
And a successful confrontation with Israel \u201cwould help Hizbollah convince Tehran it is still worth having around\u201d, the official speculated.<\/p>\n
Additional reporting by James Shotter and Andrew England in Jerusalem<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Over the past year, Lebanese militant group Hizbollah has passively absorbed blow after blow as near daily Israeli…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":159067,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[42,43,40,38,41,39],"class_list":{"0":"post-159066","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-headlines","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-top-news","11":"tag-top-stories","12":"tag-topnews","13":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/159066","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=159066"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/159066\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/159067"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=159066"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=159066"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=159066"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}