There is no doubt that Hezbollah is under pressure. The interview Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah gave this week proves that. Since the catastrophic explosion at the Beirut port in the summer of 2020, the Lebanese terrorist organization has seen its popularity wane steadily. In the last election, it lost some of its political power and now Nasrallah is trying to recoup the status of "defender of Lebanon" against Israel.
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Nasrallah sees the maritime border dispute between Israel and Lebanon and attempts to harvest gas from offshore deposits in Israel's maritime territory as an opportunity to flex his muscles and win the support of the Lebanese people.
When IDF forces pulled out of Lebanon in 2000, the two countries drew a land border with help from the UN that is known as the Blue Line. No agreement was ever reached about the maritime border, and attempts to bring in authorized surveyors failed. Immediately after the Israeli withdrawal, Israel declared that the maritime border would be an extension of the land border, starting at the Rosh Hanikra coastline. The angle at which the border extends affects the natural gas deposits discovered offshore, including Karish.
If the angle of the border were a little more to the south, part of the Karish gas field would lie to the north of it, and in Lebanese territory. Establishing the border is something that must be handled professionally, and it is currently under discussion, with mediation by the US, and it appears that an agreement will soon be signed.
In the interview, Nasrallah discussed these negotiations, to which Hezbollah is not a party. However, the group is trying to influence them by putting pressure on Israel. The drones it fired recently at the Karish gas rig were a signal that Hezbollah sees Karish as a red line and will attack it if the facility begins extracting gas. But Israel didn't respond to the drones, and Nasrallah saw that as weakness. In the interview, he underscored his threats and warned Israel not to start producing gas from Karish until a border was agreed on. In effect, he pulled a gun.
Nasrallah also said that Lebanon needed to produce gas from the offshore fields, or it would attack all the gas fields in Israel's economic zone, not only Karish. This is now Nasrallah sees things: he has identified the American weakness in the region, he has gotten a tailwind from the Saudis' cool response to US President Joe Biden at the Jeddah summit and the "meeting of lepers" in Tehran between Russian President Vladimir Putin, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, and Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi. He is also reading the Israeli political map and realizes that Israel is going into an election and has an interim government, so he dares to make threats and issue an ultimatum.
Israel needs to take Nasrallah's words very seriously. There is no need to panic, but the relevant systems should be in readiness for any scenario. Israel must finish the negotiations with Lebanon about the maritime border and enlist the US to help Lebanon produce gas north of the border in Lebanese waters, where there are most likely other fields.
Israel should continue to produce gas as usual from the fields in its economic zone, despite the threats, and be ready to eradicate any threat from Hezbollah.
Still, Nasrallah is mistaken in his interpretation of Israel's lack of response to the drone attack. Israel must make it clear that any challenge will meet with a disproportional response, and will attack costly targets in Lebanon itself.
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