The Resistance Axis’ strategic mistake

Iran-led alliance is paying the price for its policy of restraint

The sudden fall, without any resistance, of Damascus and other major Syrian cities to armed opposition forces led by Hay’at Tahrir ash-Sham (formerly the Nusra Front) exposes the strategic mistake made by the ‘Resistance Axis’ with its policy of restraint, strategic patience, and avoiding confrontation with Israel or even the local factions backed by the US or Turkey.
To explain, we can start with Syria. The country was constantly subjected to incessant Israeli airstrikes targeting Iranian forces and concentrations, assassinating high-ranking commanders, and even bombing the Iranian consulate in Damascus and killing a number of senior officials. Syria did not retaliate.

In Lebanon, for nearly a year the resistance avoided using its heavy precision missiles in response to the Israeli army’s wars of annihilation against the Gaza Strip and South Lebanon. The rationale always given for this was to avoid expanding the war and entering a direct confrontation with Israel that could lead to the carpet-bombing of Beirut. Yet the occupier-state proceeded to pulverise the Lebanese capital’s southern suburbs and most of the town and villages in South Lebanon and the Bekaa Valley, after perpetrating the pages massacre and assassinating most of Hezbollah’s front-rank leaders including secretary-general Hassan Nasrallah and his anticipated successor Hashem Safieddine.

In Syria, would it not have been more honourable for president Bashar al-Asad to die fighting after retaliating for Israel’s multiple aggressions with Syrian missiles and drones, or even an attempted retake of the Golan Heights, than end up as a ‘humanitarian’ refugee in Russia — which never heeded his appeals for sophisticated air-defence systems to fend off Israeli attacks?

Israel was terrified of Hezbollah’s missile and drone arsenals. If volleys of heavy precision missiles had been launched to bring down buildings in Tel Aviv and Haifa, or destroy vital infrastructure like power and water plants, in retaliation for what Israel did to the southern suburbs, things would not have ended as they did for Hezbollah — with its leaders gone, its popular power base displaced, and its capital (the southern suburbs) destroyed. All it got in return for its restraint was a fragile cease-fire agreement that Netanyahu did not honour and never will for the foreseeable future.

The first brick in the ‘New Middle East’ Netanyahu wants to build is a subjugated Lebanon and Lebanese resistance, with the country shackled by agreements designed by US envoy Amos Hochstein (a former Israeli army officers) to achieve that end.

The second is represented by the current US-Israeli-Turkish assault on Syria, and the toppling of its regime without the firing of a single bullet.

The third brick is expected to be Iran. Netanyahu said he only agreed to the Lebanon ceasefire to focus on achieving his total victory over Gaza and Iran.

The Resistance Axis made strategic mistakes by not reacting swiftly to US and Israeli schemes to fragment and dismember it. The only exception was in Gaza. Its leader Yahya Sinwar was not intimidated by the Israeli enemy and did not pursue the policy of restraint and strategic patience, but achieved a stunning victory over Israel by launching the al-Aqsa Flood and carrying the battle into the occupied Palestinian interior.

After the fall of its crown jewel Syria, the Resistance Axis needs to make some radical reassessments and change the counterproductive policy of strategic patience. It should speed up efforts to achieve a defensive nuclear capability and confront these US and Israeli schemes without fear or trepidation. The US-Zionist camp only understands the language of force. When the resistance was strong and defiant, they didn’t dare assassinate any of its figures in Lebanon or elsewhere out of fear of the devastating response.

Netanyahu has now torn up the 1974 disengagement agreement with Syria and occupied Mount Hermon, the buffer zone, and more territory on the Syrian side of the Golan Heights. He has relentlessly bombed Syrian airbases and military sites even though the former regime no longer exists and was replaced by one that is beholden to the US and takes its orders from his loyal ally Turkey.

There are no Arabs or Muslims left. The replacement of the Syrian regime — despite our many reservations about it, especially its unprecedented human rights violations — is a prelude to regime-changes in Iraq and Yemen and even Saudi Arabia, Jordan, and Egypt. Netanyahu has become the region’s overlord, and it will pay him tribute.

https://www.raialyoum.com/the-resistance-axis-strategic-mistake/