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What Is Hezbollah?

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There are many terror organizations around the world that may want to do harm to the United States or our allies and interests to promote their ideology or to gain notoriety for the group. Some terror groups can be non-state sponsored and some can be state sponsored. Some are large organizations such as Al Qaeda and ISIS while some may be subordinate organizations to the larger organizations or function under their name across the globe. We must continue to evaluate and gather intelligence on all these organizations to reduce the possibility of an attack on our homeland or interests overseas. One such organization the United States needs to watch and continue to evaluate is Hezbollah. Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage identified …show more content…

Its origins date back to 1982. It originated during the civil war in Lebanon 1975 – 1990. Lebanon is a fractured country with many political groups divided by religion, where and how residents live. Lebanon has a very urbanized coast and mountainous inland region adding to many different tribes separated by valleys and mountains. There were three groups influenced by different political parties from Lebanon, Iran and Iraq that led to its development. The three parties were the Fatah led by Yasser Arafat, the Amal and the Al Dawa party. These parties originally made up the core group of Hezbollah. The formation is Hezbollah is very lengthy and many elements contributed to it from all neighbors in the region but essentially the group was formed during the invasion of southern Lebanon as a group to resist the invasion of Israeli forces. (Avon, 2012) Lebanon has had a unique political sectarian structure with a political environment cultivating many parties to try and gain power and influence in Lebanon. Hezbollah came into existence at the peak of instability in Lebanon. Iranian delegates in Lebanon helped organize the three main groups into a formed group under the umbrella of Hezbollah. They were ideologically developed to be anti West and anti Israel. (Azani, …show more content…

They forced the Israeli forces from the majority of southern Lebanon other than the Sheeba Farm and Hezbollah was able to remain in the area and take a stronger foothold of the area. Its guerrilla tactics are largely believed to be responsible for the removal of Israeli forces. It has continued to increase its weapons arsenal. (Talbot, 2008) The weapons Hezbollah maintains are significant and include several offensive weapons platforms. It is estimated that Hezbollah maintains 10 to 12 thousand missiles of which about 8 thousand of them are Katyusha rockets capable of reaching far into Israel. These rockets are supplied by Iran. The biggest concern for Israel is Hezbollah’s Zelzal-2 heavy artillery rockets capable of reaching Tel Aviv. Iran provides expertise and command and control of these systems to help Hezbollah. Israel destroyed large parts of the missile system during the 2006 war but it is believed many missiles remain. Hezbollah has the capability to hit all of Israel’s largest cities with these weapons. (Talbot, 2008) Having these weapons and the knowledge to use them is of great concern to Israel but also American interests in the region. They have proven in the past they will attack American interests and because of this there influence and Iranian backing cannot be

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