On the night of October 1st, Iran, for the second time, directly attacked Israel with a barrage of ballistic and hypersonic missiles. That said, this attack starkly differed from Tehran’s previous attack that took place in April 2024 and led to a higher level of destruction in Israel since Tel Aviv’s air defense systems failed to intercept some of the missiles, given the intensity of the attack. This time around, unlike the previous attack, Iran used almost 200 developed missiles, which reached different areas inside Israel within only 12 minutes. Moreover, although Iranian officials claimed that they informed the US and Russia a short while before the initiation of the attack, the US State Department denied the Iranian claim. This situation clearly shows that Iran wanted to inflict bigger harm than the previous attack in April in an attempt to restore its credibility in the eyes of its allies and its deterrence in the of its foes. The Pentagon also announced that the Iranian attack was twice the size of the previous attack in April. Moreover, the attack was carried out from underground, which also helped Iran inflict a heavier blow on Israel as it was more challenging to gather prior intelligence for such an operation. It is also noteworthy that the attack was approved by the Iranian Supreme Security Council, which showed the Iranian state consensus.

 

Iranian officials declared that the attack was carried out as a retaliation for the killing of the slain Axis of Resistance leaders: Hamas leader Ismail Haniyyah, Lebanese Hezbollah Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah, and IRGC commander Abbas Nilforoushan who was killed with Nasrallah in the same Israeli attack in the Dahiyeh suburbs of Beirut.

 

The Erosion of Iranian Deterrence

Since the 7th of October, Iranian deterrence has been severely challenged due to Israeli strikes targeting IRGC officials as well as Iran’s non-state armed proxies in the region. However, nothing was more severe for Tehran than the killing of Lebanese Hezbollah Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah in an Israeli Operation that Tel Aviv dubbed as the ‘New Order.’ Hence, Iran was pushed into the corner, and it had to retaliate against Israel. Otherwise, Iran’s credibility in the eyes of its non-state allies would have further eroded, and the country’s ‘forward defense’ doctrine would have been at stake. What is worse, the targeting of Iranian soil would have only been a matter of time for Tel Aviv.

 

Following the recent Iranian attack, Iranian officials’ remarks show that Tehran still wants to avoid a larger war in the region. This situation has previously also been exemplified by the new Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian’s remarks, too. Until now, President Pezeshkian has been aspiring to engage in a working relationship with the West. Moreover, in a recent audio recording, he was heard saying that Iran was ready to lay down arms in case Israel was prepared to do so, as well.

 

Nonetheless, it is also seen that Tehran is not bluffing and will face up to a larger regional war and engage in an open-ended conflict with Israel should Tel Aviv not stop and continue to inflict heavy blows on Tehran directly on Iranian soil or in Lebanon, for example. Now, the scale of Israel’s response to the Iranian attack will show the trajectory of the ongoing war.

 

The Dire Situation in Lebanon

The assassination of Hassan Nasrallah by Israel on the 27th of September is likely to mark one of the most dramatic events in the history of Lebanon. The Secretary-General was killed along with high-ranking military commanders in a tunnel that Israel claimed to be Hezbollah’s headquarters. Bunker-buster bombs amounting to 85 tons were used in the attack. Six buildings were flattened as a result, which is thought to have led to the death of hundreds of people. Nasrallah’s death can be considered the most significant political assassination in the region over the past couple of decades. Given Hezbollah’s tight grip on the Lebanese political scene, Hezbollah’s role-model structure for Iranian-backed groups, and Hezbollah’s training and coordinating capabilities for its allies, especially after Qasem Soleimani’s assassination, the group’s organic role in Iran’s military structure and its ongoing role in the Syrian Civil War since 2011, the recent attack can be viewed even more substantial than the killing of Al-Qaida leaders Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri, and ISIS leader Abu-Bakr al-Baghdadi.

 

In a nutshell, Nasrallah was the embodiment of Hezbollah. He left behind a vacuum that is almost impossible to be filled. Nasrallah, due to his charisma and religious knowledge, accompanied by his warfare strategies stemming from his past in the fight against the Israeli forces following the invasion of Beirut by Israel in 1982, made him one of the most critical players in the Lebanese political scene. While he was at the helm of Hezbollah, the group gradually increased its clout in the country’s political system by translating its military power into a tutelage over Lebanese politics. Nasrallah was killed exactly a week after his group was subjected to an extraordinary pager attack, which led to the killing of dozens of people and left more than two thousand people wounded. For the time being, after the hefty blow inflicted on Hezbollah through assassinations and disruptions of communication lines in the group, Hezbollah seems to be in tatters. The organization’s top brass is almost eliminated in the Israeli attacks. And bouncing back in a short period of time does not seem to be within reach for Hezbollah.

 

Additionally, Israel claims to have very much damaged Hezbollah’s arsenal, with some analysts claiming that half the organization’s arsenal was destroyed. Yet, Hezbollah denies these claims. Additionally, the group has been primarily infiltrated by Israel, creating a dramatic sense of insecurity among the group members. Israel seems to have a strong intelligence network on the ground in Lebanon, resulting in a huge security and intelligence failure for Hezbollah.

 

In spite of this situation, Hezbollah tries to resist the Israeli attacks with its remainder capacity, as seen in the group’s announcement of preventing an infiltration attempt by the Israeli troops through an ambush. Nonetheless, due to the current level of mistrust, defections or divides are possible within the group. Moreover, the delicate political balance in Lebanon is also threatened by the Israeli attacks. It may not be a far-fetched scenario in which different Lebanese political factions try to vie for power, capitalizing on the vacuum left by Nasrallah’s death in the upcoming period should the situation in the country become direr with more fierce Israeli aggression. Challenging the political status quo in Lebanon can pave the way for new nightmares in the country.

 

The Israeli attacks on Lebanon claimed the lives of hundreds of civilians thus far. The vicious attacks also led to the displacement of around a million people, a number that is impossible for the Lebanese government to tackle. Lebanon has already been in a very severe political and economic situation. The country has been suffering from a severe financial crisis over the past years. In addition to these points, in 2020, the Beirut Port explosion destroyed the economic infrastructure and compounded the economic crisis. Moreover, the current government in Lebanon is a caretaker one. Worse than this, the country has been unable to elect a president for almost three years.

 

Upon all these problems came the seventh of October and Hamas’s Al-Aqsa Flood Operation. The Lebanese Hezbollah was not informed beforehand about the operation, as per Nasrallah’s speeches. However, since October 8th, Hezbollah joined the fight as a ‘support front’ to Gaza. Despite expectations and the pressure on the group, Hezbollah made very clear that it would not join the fight full force from the very beginning, capitalizing on the lessons of the war that took place between Israel and Hezbollah in 2006. The July War of 2006 led to a heavy level of destruction in Lebanon, and Hezbollah thought it had to refrain from facing a similar scenario over the past year. Nasrallah many times put forth that the war of attrition between Hezbollah and Israel would come to an end once a ceasefire agreement is reached in Gaza. However, the traditional rules of engagement between the two sides eroded gradually, leading the group to use previously unused long-range missiles to hit Haifa following considerable casualties.

 

Over the past period, Israel has shown to the world that it does not recognize any red lines. Thus, it engaged in very high-ranking killings of both Hamas and Hezbollah leadership. It destroyed Gaza and made it an uninhabitable place primarily. Iran, which has invested in the group for decades, thought Hezbollah was very valuable to lose or to inflict harm on it. Thus, Tehran also did not want Hezbollah to be dragged into an all-out war with Israel and capitalized on the ‘strategic patience’ concept that Tehran employed since the IRGC commander Qasem Soleimani’s assassination by the US in Iraq in 2020. Nonetheless, the strategic patience concept did not work with the Netanyahu government due to Israel’s unrestricted attacks and the Netanyahu government’s intransigence to refrain from a ceasefire agreement in Gaza, which could bring an end to Netanyahu’s premiership tenure. Benjamin Netanyahu effectively changed the rules of engagement between the two sides by escalating tension to an unseen level through high-ranking assassinations.

 

Consequently, Iran faced a stark dilemma: Entering the fray or staying on the sidelines. Both options had consequences. Tehran had opted for escalation. As a matter of fact, it had to enter the fray and try to deter Israel from taking further detrimental steps at a time when Tel Aviv made very clear its intention to invade southern Lebanon in a so-called ‘limited and localized’ invasion. Otherwise, Lebanese Hezbollah could face an existential problem (it can still face this scenario depending on Israel’s upcoming response). This would have also decreased Tehran’s reliability in its ally network, creating an unpleasant and unaffordable reality for Iran.

 

Up until now, Israel has been displacing civilians from Southern Lebanon. Thus far, around a million people have been displaced in Lebanon due to the vicious strikes, taking shelter in the Lebanese capital, Beirut, and other areas in Lebanon, as well as some parts of Syria. Tel Aviv also tries to destroy what is left of the Hezbollah arsenal in an attempt to clear the way for its ground invasion to reach at least the Litany River. Israel, up until Iran’s recent attack, considered itself quite strong. It thought that it had the legitimacy to wage a full-fledged war on Lebanon despite the growing international isolation of Tel Aviv, which was recently exemplified in Netanyahu’s recent UN speech when representatives of many countries walked out of the chamber once Netanyahu came to the podium to deliver his speech.

 

Israel perceives the current situation in Northern Israel as existential. The return of Israelis to these areas is essential for Tel Aviv. The scenario of an empty Northern Israel is tantamount to losing territory to Hezbollah and Iran. This reality, coupled with the inaction of the regional countries to face up to Israel and the inability of the international community to impose debilitating sanctions on Tel Aviv, made the country more relentless in its attacks gradually.

 

In short, the region is undergoing historic days with Yemen, Iraq, partly Syria, Lebanon, and Gaza, has been on fire since the 7th of October. The region may really be at the dawn of a ‘new order.’ Only time will tell whether this order will be in the shape that Israel aspires to have.