By Piere Haski 

By eliminating Salah al-Arouri, a senior Hamas leader, with a drone strike in Beirut, Israel took a calculated risk: that Lebanese Hezbollah and its Iranian allies would not go to war over the death of a member of Hamas. Risky bet.

Israel yesterday struck its strongest blow against the leadership of Hamas, the Islamist movement responsible for the October 7 massacre. But paradoxically, it was not in the Gaza Strip, which had been shelled incessantly for almost three months, that this blow was struck, but in Beirut, the Lebanese capital.

An Israeli drone eliminated the number two in the Hamas political bureau, Salah al-Arouri. He was in the organization's premises, in the southern suburbs of Beirut, the stronghold of its ally, the pro-Iranian Hezbollah. It was Hezbollah which confirmed the death of the Hamas leader and five other people, and which accused Israel.

Salah al-Arouri was an important figure in the organization. Last month, the French-speaking Beirut daily, “L’Orient-le-Jour”, recalled that his installation in Lebanon, from 2018, had marked the rise of Hamas in the country. With political action towards the Palestinian camps in Lebanon, but also a discreet presence of its military branch which worried Israel.

Israeli leaders needed success in their drive to eradicate Hamas after the October 7 attack. They have not achieved it so far in the Gaza Strip, despite the colossal human cost inflicted on Palestinian civilians. The two main leaders of the movement in the territory, Yahya Sinouar, and Mohammed Deif, remain untraceable. The elimination of the number two from the Political Bureau serves a maligned Israeli Prime Minister.

But Israel also took a calculated risk by striking a Hamas leader abroad. This risk is that of pushing Hezbollah a little further on the path to generalized war with Israel, bringing with it a bloodless Lebanon. Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah is giving a highly anticipated speech today.

For almost three months, the risk of opening a front in northern Israel has been omnipresent, with a slow but controlled escalation on both sides. Israel is betting that the assassination of a Hamas leader will not tip Hezbollah into a war which would then change in scale.

Does this risk exist? Everything will depend on Iran. Hezbollah would not take the initiative for such a considerable escalation without the green light from Tehran, which ensures its arming and financing.

Iran had already suffered the blow after the death, on December 25, of the highest ranking officer of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards, General Razi Moussavi, during an Israeli strike in Syria. Tehran declared that Israel would pay “a high price” for this targeted assassination. This is therefore a second hard blow for Tehran, which has managed the escalation of the conflict to the millimeter for three months, without taking the risk of being drawn into it.

Strangely, this sudden rise in tension coincides with the American decision to withdraw the aircraft carrier Gerald Ford which had been in the Eastern Mediterranean since October. He played a deterrent role, and his departure is unexplained and can therefore be subject to contradictory interpretations.

Once again, the Middle East is at a decisive moment, not between peace and war, but between the Gaza war and a regional conflagration.

Source: (FRANCE INTER)