John Bell and John Zada are co-founders of The Conciliators Guild, an international conflict-resolution organization based in Oxford, England.
Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of Hezbollah assassinated by Israel on Friday, was a large and charismatic figure in the Arab and Islamic worlds. He was considered by many as the most able and articulate confronter of Israel and its occupation of Arab and Palestinian land. Mr. Nasrallah’s sermon-like speeches, riddled with a mix of apparent wisdom and defiance, captivated millions in the same way that former Egyptian president Gamal Abdel Nasser once did in the mid-20th century. Like Nasser, he also leaves behind a legacy of bravado, and of a dream as yet unfulfilled. One of the authors has met twice with Mr. Nasrallah in a diplomatic capacity and can attest to his charisma and cleverness.
This view is tempered by those who despise him and his organization: certainly Israelis and many Americans who view Hezbollah as a terrorist organization. Meanwhile, many Arabs regard Hezbollah’s actions in Syria, Lebanon and elsewhere as those of a violent and coercive cult-like mafia dressed up in ideological garb.
The common view by analysts will be that Hezbollah, its rhetoric and actions, is a way of thinking and being, an ideology, that will survive the death of one man – in much the same way that Mr. Nasrallah was brought in to take over from his predecessor in 1992. Statements made by Hezbollah and its ally and patron Iran over the weekend seem to confirm this trajectory. So long as Israeli oppression remains, they say, so the resistance will persist, even at the expense of future martyrs, including celebrated and quasi-deified ones like Mr. Nasrallah.
Mr. Nasrallah was the incarnation of an ideology and a rare historical figure who could manifest in his person, and his being, a certain idea. Former Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) leader Yasser Arafat was another. Although Hezbollah is more organized and capable than the PLO ever was, it may well be that his death, like Nasser and Arafat before him, may foretell some shift in the organization’s role into the future.
At the moment, the Iranian regime is focused on diplomacy rather than war. Another death, that of Iran’s former president Ebrahim Raisi, and the rise of his successor Masoud Pezeshkian, permitted this shift. Many will argue this new approach by Tehran is pure theatrics. Certainly Israel’s tactical and technical military performance and boldness since Oct. 7 last year will have given Iran pause for thought. This, however, leaves the fighting to Hezbollah and the damage to Lebanon.
However, Hezbollah’s fatal flaw has also in some ways been revealed: It cannot deter Israel without threatening to use of all its power and risking the total destruction of Lebanon; any lesser threat has not deterred Israel. This failure to deter has damaged its reputation as an all-powerful resistance group and this will leave its domestic and regional opponents with doubts about its future.
The decimation of three levels of leadership, as well as rank and file, and its profound psychological setbacks can all be overcome. But this will take time, and the end result may be an organization quite different than the one we have previously known. Whether it will be incapable of reasserting its much-taunted primacy, defanged or reorganized into a technologically more competent group is unknown. But change is likely to come.
With the passing of such a large figure leaving his organization orphaned, the many Lebanese groups who opposed Hezbollah’s actions and policies will now perceive a weaker group and a more level playing field domestically. If these opponents play wisely, there is now more space to seek a new national compact in Lebanon. If not, there will be great risks.
Whatever happens, the bottom line for the region transcends the death of a charismatic and notorious figure: There will never be a healthier Middle East, nor a better Lebanon, until ardent ideologies such as Hezbollah’s give way to more helpful paradigms. The core needs of citizens on all sides need to be sufficiently satisfied, such that they no longer attach intensely to ideologies and dogmas to redress imbalances and injustices, past and present. This applies to all countries in the Middle East, including Israel and its aggressive trend of religious Zionism.
Nasrallah, like Nasser and Arafat before him, is a hero to his followers and acolytes. But, like other such leaders, it may be that the attention paid to him and his inflammatory bravado could have been better spent on a cooler and more pragmatic reading of the enemy, and the pursuit of more tangible, positive ends. The seeds of such a more constructive view may have now been sown, even as the blustery calls for revenge and an endless resistance drowns out any evidence of it.