The foreign relations of Hezbollah involve relations with other particularly Shia states, but also Sunni groups like those affiliated with the Palestinian cause; the group is also suggested to have operations outside the Middle East in places such as Latin America.
Contents
- Position of the UN
- Iran
- Syria
- Hamas
- Alleged Relationship with Al Qaeda
- al Mahdi Army
- Palestinian Islamic Jihad Movement
- European Union
- Attitude of Israel to Hezbollah
- Relationship with other countries and organizations
- United States
- Arab League
- References
Hezbollah has close relations with Iran. It also has ties with the Alawite leadership in Syria, specifically with President Hafez al-Assad (until his death in 2000) and his son and successor Bashar al-Assad. Hezbollah declared its support for the now-concluded al-Aqsa intifada.
There is little evidence of ongoing Hezbollah contact or cooperation with al-Qaeda. Hezbollah's leaders denies links to al-Qaeda, present or past. al-Qaeda's leaders, such as former Al-Qaeda in Iraq leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, consider Shia, which most Hezbollah members are, to be apostates, as do Salafi-jihadis today. However, the 9/11 Commission Report found that several Al-Qaeda operatives and top military commanders were sent to Hezbollah training camps in Lebanon in 1994.
Position of the UN
UN Security Council Resolution 1559, calls for "the disbanding and disarmament of all Lebanese and non-Lebanese militia", echoing the Taif Agreement that ended the Lebanese Civil War, but does not explicitly include Hezbollah although Kofi Annan has advanced this interpretation. The Lebanese Government and Hezbollah dispute the application of this resolution to Hezbollah, referring to it as a "resistance movement" and not a militia. Israel has lodged complaints about Hezbollah's actions with the UN.
The UN's Deputy Secretary-General, Mark Malloch Brown, contests characterisations of the Lebanese militia as a terrorist organisation in the mould of al-Qaeda. While acknowledging that “Hezbollah employs terrorist tactics,” he says that it is unhelpful to call it a terrorist organization; the United States and the international community, in his view, would do well to respect it as a legitimate political party. Brown also criticized Hezbollah when he said, "It is making no effort to hit military targets; it's just a broadside against civilian targets." On the other end of the spectrum, there are some in the United Nations who deny that Hezbollah's military activities against civilians are terrorist in nature at all.
Iran
In a July 20, 2006 article, scholar Fred Halliday wrote that Sheikh Naim Qassem, deputy leader of Hezbollah under Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah, told him Hezbollah follows Iran's leadership as a matter of principle.
Syria
In an interview on Al-Arabiya TV in Dubai, former Hezbollah Secretary-General Subhi Al-Tufeili said Hezbollah definitely fosters its relations with the Syrians, but Hezbollah's real leadership is 'the rule of the jurisprudence'. Though Hezbollah presence in Syria was limited before 2012, Damascus had been the most important facilitator of Iranian support to the group and became increasingly active as a provider of material and political assistance on its own in the 2000s.
Since 2012 Hezbollah is helping the Syrian government during the Syrian Civil War in the fight against the rebels, which Hezbollah has described as a Wahhabi-Zionist conspiracy to destroy its alliance with Syria against Israel.
Hamas
Hezbollah is a role model to Hamas in terms of its military, political, and media operations. The two groups share common tactics and common goals as well as close ties to Iran. According to an Israeli military source, Hezbollah assists Hamas with bomb production. Nasrallah has declared his support for the al-Aqsa Intifada.
In 2013, Hezbollah has ordered Hamas to leave Lebanon, due to Hamas support for opposition forces fighting against the Syrian President Bashar Assad. Hamas and the Lebanese Islamic Jihad denied these reports.
Alleged Relationship with Al-Qaeda
There is no concrete evidence of Hezbollah contact or cooperation with al-Qaida. United States intelligence officials speculate there has been contact between Hezbollah and low-level al-Qaeda figures who fled Afghanistan for Lebanon. Ali Mohamed testified that Hezbollah trained al-Qaeda operatives on how to use explosives. In addition, Hezbollah and Al-Qaeda cooperate through money laundering, smuggling, and document forgeries. Some American newspapers have suggested a broader alliance between Hezbollah, al-Qaeda, and the Iranian Revolutionary Guard.
On the other hand, others point out that al-Qaeda’s Sunni ideology is fundamentally incompatible with Hezbollah’s relatively liberal brand of Shia Islam; in fact, some Wahhabi leaders consider Hezbollah to be apostate. There is a Fatwa issued several years ago by Abdullah Ibn Jibreen, a former member of Saudi Arabia's Council of Senior Ulema, which describes Hezbollah as "rafidhi" – a derogatory term for Shiites used by some Sunni fanatics. Even during 2006 Israel-Lebanon conflict it was cited by some hardline Sunni Muslim clerics and others writing on Islamist website.
Al-Qaeda has demonstrated its distaste for Shi’as in suicide bombings and attacks on Shi’a civilian targets in Iraq. Hezbollah denies any ties to al-Qaeda and al-Qaeda leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi has issued an audio recording in which he called Hezbollah an "enemy of Sunnis." Saint Petersburg Times, ABC News, and MSNBC report that there exists no evidence of a connection between Hezbollah and al-Qaeda. Nasrallah denies links to al-Qaeda, present or past, stating in a 2002 interview that the two groups work in different areas and face different enemies. Hezbollah’s aim has been to confront, and ultimately destroy, Israel, while bin Laden has focused on Afghanistan, Bosnia, and the former Yugoslavia.
As part of a surge of intersectarian support for Hezbollah during the 2006 Israel-Lebanon conflict, Ayman al-Zawahiri, al-Qaeda’s deputy leader, called for Muslims to rise up in a holy war against Zionists and join the fighting in Lebanon.
al-Mahdi Army
Hezbollah claims that it forbids its fighters entry into Iraq for any reason, and that no Hezbollah units or individual fighters have entered Iraq to support any Iraqi faction fighting the United States. On April 2, 2004, Iraqi cleric and Mahdi Army founder Muqtada al-Sadr announced his intention to form chapters of Hezbollah and Hamas in Iraq, and Mahdi senior member Abu Mujtaba claimed they were choosing 1,500 fighters to go to Lebanon.
Palestinian Islamic Jihad Movement
There have been American claims that Hezbollah has engaged in joint operations with the Sunni Palestinian militant group Palestinian Islamic Jihad Movement. The Islamic Jihad Movement has send "its gratitude to the brothers in Hezbollah, the Islamic resistance in South Lebanon. Particularly Hassan Nasrallah, for their stance and support, be it financial, military or moral support".
European Union
In July 2013, the European Union designated the armed wing of Hezbollah as a terrorist organization. The foreign ministers of all 28 EU countries agreed to the decision which was based on concerns over Hezbollah's role in the 2012 Burgas bus bombing and the organizations involvement in Syrian civil war supporting the Ba'ath government.
Two EU countries have imposed partial or complete prohibitions on Hezbollah. The Netherlands has proscribed the organisation fully, while the United Kingdom has proscribed Hezbollah's paramilitary External Security Organization, but not the organisation's political wing.
Attitude of Israel to Hezbollah
Dan Gillerman, the Israeli representative at UN, referred to Hezbollah as a "cancerous growth" that must be removed.
The Israeli Government considers the use of military force in Lebanon as a legitimate means of Isolating Hizb’Allah.
Betar, a revisionist Zionist youth movement, uses the Holocaust and Nazis as a cognitive filter to describe Hezbollah.
Relationship with other countries and organizations
Hezbollah has been accused of training Iraqi insurgents to attack U.S. troops during the Iraq War. Besides Iran and Syria, Hezbollah also has ties with Venezuela and "has demonstrated a keen interest in extending its activities to other parts of Latin America." Hezbollah has also been known to recruit and train eastern Europeans, most notably in Russia, Bosnia, and Slovakia.
United States
The United States believes Hezbollah is an organization with ties to terrorism. The United States officially support the peaceful restructuring of Israel, and reconciliation with the Palestinian territories, (i.e. West Bank and the Gaza Strip). Due to their terrorist activities, neither Hezbollah or Hamas have been invited to be a part of any peace process led by the United States.
Arab League
On March 11, 2016, the Arab League designated Hezbollah a terrorist organization during a meeting of Arab League foreign ministers at the organization's headquarters in Egypt's capital Cairo. Nearly all 22 Arab League members supported the decision, except Lebanon, Syria, Algeria and Iraq which expressed "reservations" about the decision.