Joseph Daher is a Swiss-Syrian left-wing activist and scholar. His is author of Hezbollah: The Political Economy of the Party of God and Syria After the Uprisings, The Political Economy of State Resilience.
Since October 8, 2023, Hezbollah has been engaged in a limited war with Israel, which Netanyahu’s government escalated last month in a series of attacks on Lebanese society. Jacobin spoke to Lebanon scholar Joseph Daher about the dilemma the party faces.
Having painted itself into a corner by launching a war that has killed 40,000 Palestinians and failed to defeat Hamas, Israel has doubled down, provoking a wider war with Iran and Hezbollah to bring in the US against enemies it cannot vanquish alone.
Many are worried the Israel-Hamas war could draw in Hezbollah. But the party lacks the widespread support it once enjoyed because of its collaboration with Assad in Syria and its close ties with business interests.
The Iraqi Kurds were supposed to be liberated by Saddam’s removal. Instead, they face corrupt regional parties and a hostile central state.
The explosion that devastated Beirut was an indictment of the parties that have misruled Lebanon for decades. Now, however, those parties are using the disaster as a pretext to deepen neoliberal policies, with French leader Emmanuel Macron and the IMF egging them on.
The streets of Lebanon are ringing with protest chants as the country witnesses its largest popular movement in decades. Their target: a political and economic system that impoverishes the many while enriching the few.
Bashar al-Assad has started confiscating the homes of Syrians who fled during the Civil War. For decades, his clan has purged the state of all but the most fanatical loyalists: now, it’s doing the same to society itself.
Recent elections in Iraq show that the country’s voters are tired of a political system that produces only corruption and inequality.
Democratic forces have always been the main target of the Assad regime.
Hezbollah’s record shows that the party’s interests are more aligned with elites than with workers.