Airport officials in Beirut reportedly caught a man smuggling millions of dollars into Lebanon to be delivered to Hezbollah. Lebanese officials intervening so publicly to disrupt Hezbollah’s cash flow is unusual, to say the least.
Presumably, everyone in his right mind can agree that the reassertion of Lebanese sovereignty over its own country against Iranian proxy militias is a good thing. The world can—but probably won’t—thank Israel for demanding that Lebanon crack down on such smuggling and for aiding Lebanese forces’ ability to do so.
Israeli strategic and intelligence coordination is part of Lebanese improvements in security, surely. But that’s the carrot; the stick is that Israel won’t let South Lebanon turn back into Hezbollahland or anything like it, and the IDF isn’t going to leave the Lebanese armed forces to do so on their own until Israel is sure they can hack it.
“There is no real and lasting stability without full Israeli withdrawal,” says the new Lebanese premier, Nawaf Salam. He’s got it backwards, though—when stability can be (reasonably) assured, Israel will happily withdraw fully. As it stands, the IDF has left most of South Lebanon except for five strategic posts. Anything Hezbollah smuggles into the country can be assumed to be aimed at hurting Israel, and therefore Israel cannot simply leave it be.
That’s true in Syria as well. There’s some grumbling about Israel’s more active posture toward securing Syrian territory south of Damascus. Israel’s overall demand, that southern Syria remain demilitarized, is a clear message to the new Syrian government, which ousted the Assad regime: Jerusalem cannot let the chaotic transition period in which the government works to assert control over all its territory allow space for a Hezbollah-style ministate to plant its seeds.
This should be obvious: Why would Israel allow a second South Lebanon? The goal is to ensure that when the dust settles on this regional post-Oct. 7 war, the new status quo looks very different from the previous one: No Hezbollahland, no Hamastan. It’s why the IDF is taking a proactive approach toward the Iranian-backed terrorist hive in Jenin in the West Bank. And for that very same reason, Israel is watching the new Syria very closely.
Some of Israel’s Syria policy is designed to help the Syrian Druze feel more secure. If that can be done successfully, a pro-Western corridor running from Kurdish territory through Druze areas to Israel’s border could emerge. This would help the new Syrian government too, since it could settle the nerves of areas that might otherwise consider breaking away from Damascus’s control. Ensuring the safety of ethnic and religious minorities in Syria would also help Damascus convince the West to give it a chance.
There is another problem: Turkey. As I wrote in December, the fall of the House of Assad created the biggest Mideast power vacuum since the fall of the Soviet Union. And Turkey, the pro-Hamas power next door, is primed to fill it.
After all, the Kurds are only on alert because Turkey put them there: Ankara periodically sends its armed forces across the border to harass and weaken America’s Kurdish allies in the fight against ISIS. The new Syrian government owes its existence in part to Turkish backing. The intent is clearly for an array of anti-Israel (and anti-U.S.) forces to use Syria much as Iran used Lebanon: as a place to cultivate and command terrorist proxies against the West.
The idea that Israel is just randomly striking Syrian territory to flex its muscles is absurd. As is the idea, increasingly voiced in some quarters, that Israel wants to sabotage Syrian state stability—as if what Israel longs for is more instability in the region.
Israel doesn’t want a power vacuum south of Damascus and it doesn’t want Syria to become a Turkish puppet regime. So it is taking steps to secure its interests, as any responsible state would, by shoring up its allies and its defenses. The fact that this is controversial while the post-Oct. 7 war is extant is childish and, frankly, hypocritical: One does not hear much caterwauling about Turkey securing its interests in Syria.
Israelis would love it if none of this were necessary. Until that happens, Israel is navigating the world as it is.
