Tikvah
Editors’ Pick

October 12, 2020

How the Arab World Turned against Hizballah

Its atrocities in Syria have rivaled those of Islamic State.

In 2000, the Iran-backed Lebanese militia Hizballah was the darling of Arabs throughout the Middle East and beyond. While most Arab rulers talked a big game about opposing Israel, the terrorist group had been fighting the IDF since the early 1980s (not to mention murdering Jews in Latin America), and had just driven it from southern Lebanon. Now, thanks to Hizballah’s blood-soaked role in maintaining Bashar al-Assad’s power in Syria, all of that has changed, and even Lebanese Shiites—the organization’s base—have begun to resent it. Lizzie Porter, drawing on a series of interviews, writes:

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