How did Hezbollah come into being and what is its military power?

After Hezbollah's war with Israel in 2006, Monday, October 23, was a doomsday day for Lebanon when Israel carried out air strikes in eastern, southern and northern Lebanon.

Lebanon's health ministry says 558 people, including dozens of women and children, have been killed in Israeli air strikes since Monday. According to the Lebanese government, thousands of people have had to be displaced and this number could increase as Israeli bombing continues.

Israel's military said its warplanes had hit "dozens of Hezbollah targets, weapons stores and rocket launchers that attack Israel." Hezbollah said it fired rockets at Israeli military installations and bases near the coastal city of Haifa in response to Israeli air strikes on Monday.

Last week, communication devices used by Hezbollah members, including pagers and walkie-talkies, began exploding, killing dozens of people and injuring hundreds in two days. Hezbollah blamed Israel for the attacks, but there has been no immediate response from Israel.

Clashes between Hezbollah and Israel have been going on for the past 11 months, intensifying after Israel invaded the Gaza Strip.

In this article, you know that there is an organization called Hezbollah, how it came into existence and how many soldiers and how many weapons it has.

Hizballah

Hezbollah is considered one of the most powerful political and military organizations of Shia Muslims in Lebanon. Founded in the 1980s with Iranian backing, the group has been fighting for the withdrawal of Israeli troops from Lebanon. Hizballah literally means 'party of God'.

Emerging with the support of a small group of Shi'ite clerics after the Israeli occupation of Lebanon, the organization's primary objectives were resistance to Israel and the withdrawal of foreign troops from Lebanon.

Hassan Nasrallah has been its leader since 1992, while the organization achieved its goal in May 2000 when Israel withdrew from there. Hezbollah's military wing, the Islamic Resistance, was behind the process.

One of its objectives was to replace Lebanon's multi-religious state with an Iranian-style Islamic state in Lebanon, but it later abandoned the idea.

Iran has long provided financial and military support to Hezbollah.

Shiites are the majority in Lebanon and the movement represents the Shia community living in Lebanon. With the withdrawal of Israeli troops from Lebanon, the organization made a place in the hearts of ordinary people.

The party's candidates now have a clear majority in Lebanon's parliament. At the same time, this organization has gained popularity among the people in terms of social, social and medical services. Jamaat has its own TV station named 'AlMinar'.

Who is Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah?

Nasrallah has led Hezbollah since 1992, playing a key role in turning the group into a political and military power.

The group is currently considered one of Lebanon's most important political parties, which also has its own armed wing.

Hassan Nasrallah, popular in both Lebanon and other Arab countries, is considered the main face of Hezbollah and has played a key role in the group's history.

He has close ties with Iran and Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Hassan Nasrallah has not come out in public for many years, due to possible assassination attacks from Israel.

However, Hassan Nasrallah is a highly respected figure for Hezbollah, whose speeches are regularly shown on TV every week.

These speeches are actually Nasrallah's main weapon for the use of force, and thus he comments on various issues in Lebanon and the world and tries to put pressure on his rivals.

Hezbollah has been accused for many years of carrying out bombings and conspiracies, especially against Israeli and American targets. It has been designated a "terrorist" organisation by Western states, Israel, gulf Arab countries and the Arab League.

Hezbollah is considered a staunch ally of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and sent thousands of militants to fight on Mr Assad's behalf during the Syrian civil war. Syria's civil war began in 2011 and the conflict intensified. Pro-government forces proved decisive in reclaiming land lost to the rebels along Hezbollah, especially along the mountainous Lebanese border.

Israel frequently attacks targets linked to Iran and Hezbollah militants in Syria, but it rarely recognizes these attacks.

However, Hezbollah's involvement in Syria has intensified sectarian tensions in Lebanon.

Hezbollah's support for Syria's Alawite Shi'ite president and strong ties with Iran have led to a sharp increase in hostility from Gulf Arab countries.

Hezbollah's military, security, and political power, as well as the social services it provides, have established its reputation as a state within the state. It has competition with government institutions due to which it is severely criticized by its rivals. In some cases, it now has more capabilities than the Lebanese military, and its military might has been used significantly against Israel in the 2006 war.

Some Lebanese see Hezbollah as a threat to the country's stability, but it is consistently popular with the Shia community.

Hezbollah's anti-Israel stance

Hezbollah's origins are difficult to pinpoint accurately, but its predecessors emerged after the Israeli invasion of southern Lebanon in response to attacks by Palestinian militants in 1982.

After the attack, Shia leaders who supported the militant response broke away from the Amal movement.

The new organization, The Islamic Amal, received considerable military and organizational support from Iran's Revolutionary Guards based in the Bekah Valley, and emerged as the most prominent and influential among the Shi'ite militias that later formed Hezbollah.

These militia groups launched attacks on the Israeli army and its ally, the Southern Lebanon Army, as well as foreign powers in Lebanon. He is said to have been involved in the 1983 bombings of the U.S. embassy and U.S. Marine barracks that killed 258 U.S. and 58 French soldiers and forced western peacekeepers to withdraw.

In 1985, Hezbollah formally announced its establishment by publishing an "open letter" identifying the United States and the Soviet Union as the main enemies of Islam and calling for the "extermination" of Israel because they said Israel was occupying Muslim lands.

The 1989 Taif Agreement, which ended Lebanon's civil war and called for disarming militias, prompted Hezbollah to transform its military wing into an "Islamic resistance" force dedicated to ending Israel's occupation, and allowing it to keep its weapons.

After the Syrian army established peace in Lebanon in 1990, Hezbollah continued its guerrilla warfare in southern Lebanon, but also began playing an active role in Lebanese politics. In 1992, he successfully contested national elections for the first time.

When Israeli forces retreated in 2000, Hezbollah was credited with pushing them out. The group resisted pressure to disarm and maintained its military presence in the south, arming itself as a justification for its continued Israeli presence in Sheba Farms and other disputed areas.

In 2006, Hezbollah militants launched a cross-border attack that killed eight Israeli soldiers and kidnapped two, prompting a strong response from Israel.

Israeli warplanes bombed Hezbollah strongholds in southern Lebanon and the southern suburbs of Beirut, while Hezbollah fired about 4,000 rockets at Israel. More than 1,125 Lebanese, most of them civilians, as well as 119 Israeli soldiers and 45 civilians were killed during the 34-day fighting.

Hezbollah survived this war against Israel and emerged with courage. Since then, however, it has started upgrading and expanding its weapons and also recruited several new fighters.

Hezbollah's strength increased

In 2008, when Lebanon's Western-backed government took steps to shut down Hezbollah's private telecommunications network and remove Beirut's airport security chief over ties to the group, Hezbollah seized much of the capital and responded by fighting rival Sunni groups.

Lebanon's government retreated to end sectarian clashes, which killed 81 people and pushed Lebanon to the brink of a new civil war. The subsequent power-sharing agreement gave Hezbollah and its allies the power to veto any cabinet decision.

In the 2009 elections, it won 10 seats in parliament and remained in the united government.

Later that year, Hezbollah chief Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah released a new political manifesto that sought to highlight the group's "political vision".

It dropped references to the Islamic Republic included in the 1985 manifesto, but maintained a tough stance against Israel and the United States, saying Hezbollah needed to keep its weapons.

In 2011, the group and its allies forced the dissolution of the Saudi-backed coalition government led by Sunni Saad Hariri. Hezbollah warned that it would not stay with it because four of its members were accused of involvement in the murder of Mr Hariri's father Rafik Hariri in 2005.

In December 2020, Hezbollah member Salim Aish was sentenced to life in absentia by the UN-backed Special Tribunal for Lebanon for his involvement in the murder.

Hezbollah and its allies have been part of subsequent governments, where they wield considerable influence.

More powerful than Hamas

Hezbollah, a Lebanese military, political and social movement, has long been seen by Israel as a more powerful force than Hamas.

Hezbollah is known in the world as an unofficial armed force that has both arms and money from Iran.

Nasrallah claims his group has 100,000 fighters, but other independent estimates put the number at between 20,000 and 50,000. These fighters are trained and have experience of fighting in the Syrian civil war.

According to the Center for Strategic and International Studies, heavily armed Iranian-backed group Hezbollah has an estimated 130,000 rockets and missiles.

Most of these weapons are small and transportable to a person, they are unguided ground-to-ground rockets.

But these include anti-aircraft and anti-ship missiles, as well as guided missiles capable of hitting inside Israel.

These weapons are more advanced than hamas has.

Jeremy Bowen, the BBC's international editor based in Jerusalem, analyzes that Hezbollah has more weapons than Hamas, as well as better trained, and its fighters have a lot of experience due to years of war in Syria.

According to him, while Hamas had dug trenches in the sand in the Gaza Strip, there are also Hezbollah trenches in the rocky and mountainous land in the south of Lebanon, but they are made of stone instead of sand.

According to Jeremy, Israel wants to push Hezbollah away from the border and end their military power to enable the return of 60,000 Israelis living in the country's enclave to their homes.

However, according to him, whether Israel will be able to do so is an important question, especially in the situation when Hezbollah continues to fire rockets into Israel across the border.