Smoke billows after an Israeli Air Force air strike in southern Lebanon village, amid cross-border hostilities between Hezbollah and Israel, as seen from northern Israel, Oct. 3, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Jim Urquhar

Lebanon’s Hezbollah has been significantly degraded militarily by Israel, but the Iran-backed terrorist group will likely try to rebuild its stockpiles and forces and pose a long-term threat to the US and its regional allies, four sources briefed on updated US intelligence told Reuters.

US intelligence agencies assessed in recent weeks that Hezbollah, even amid Israel’s military campaign, had begun to recruit new fighters and was trying to find ways to rearm through domestic production and by smuggling materials through Syria, said a senior US official, an Israeli official, and two US lawmakers briefed on the intelligence, speaking on condition of anonymity.

It’s unclear to what extent those efforts have slowed since last week when Hezbollah and Israel reached a shaky ceasefire, two of the sources said. The deal specifically prohibits Hezbollah from procuring weapons or weapons parts.

In recent days, Israel has tried to undercut Hezbollah‘s ability to rebuild its military forces, striking several Hezbollah rocket launchers in Lebanon, bombing border crossings with Syria, and blocking an Iranian aircraft suspected of ferrying weapons for the group.

US intelligence agencies assess that Hezbollah is operating with limited firepower. It has lost more than half its weapons stockpiles and thousands of fighters during the conflict with Israel, reducing Tehran’s overall military capacity to its lowest point in decades, according to the intelligence.

But Hezbollah has not been destroyed. It still maintains thousands of short-range rockets in Lebanon and it will try to rebuild using weapons factories in neighboring countries with available transport routes, the sources said.

One of the lawmakers said Hezbollah has been “knocked back” in the short term and had its ability to conduct command and control reduced. But the lawmaker added: “This organization is designed to be disrupted.”

US officials are concerned about Hezbollah‘s access to Syria, where Syrian rebels recently launched an offensive to retake government strongholds in Aleppo and Hama. Hezbollah has long used Syria as a safe haven and transport hub, taking military equipment and weapons from Iraq, through Syria, and into Lebanon through the rugged border crossings.

Washington is trying to pressure Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to limit Hezbollah‘s operations, enlisting other countries in the region to help, a senior US official said. Reuters reported on Monday that the US and the United Arab Emirates have discussed possibly lifting sanctions on Assad if he peels himself away from Iran and cuts off weapons routes to Hezbollah.

Hezbollah officials have said the group will continue to function as a “resistance” against Israel, but its secretary general Naim Qassem has not brought up the group’s weapons in recent speeches, including after the ceasefire was reached. Sources in Lebanon say Hezbollah‘s priority is rebuilding homes for its constituency after Israeli strikes destroyed swaths of Lebanon’s south and the southern suburbs of Beirut.

The US National Security Council and the Office of the Director for National Intelligence declined to comment on the updated US intelligence.

TRAINING CHALLENGES

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi said last week that Hezbollah had not been weakened by Israel’s killing of many of its leaders since January and by its ground assault against the group since early October. He said Hezbollah had been able to reorganize and fight back effectively.

However, US intelligence indicates that Israel has taken out thousands of Hezbollah‘s missiles in Lebanon, pushing cadres of its fighters back from the border with Israel, the sources told Reuters.

While tracking the exact number of Hezbollah fighters remains a challenge, the intelligence notes that the group will likely face significant training challenges for years to come, the sources said.

US officials say Hezbollah‘s breakdown points to a growing gap in Iran’s military capacity and raises doubts about its ability to use its proxies to attack Israel and its other adversaries in the short term. Iran also backs Hamas terrorists in the Gaza Strip and the Houthi terror group in Yemen.

In the past, had Israel considered bombing Iran, it faced the prospect of Hezbollah in Lebanon reciprocating, said a second US official, but with Hezbollah weakened, Israel can attack Iran directly without the same threat to its north.

In Gaza, US intelligence indicates Hamas can only sustain small, guerrilla-style tactics after having lost at least half of its fighters. The Houthis continue to launch missiles and drones from Yemen, but the US has been able to intercept most.

The updated US intelligence — briefed to senior officials and lawmakers in recent weeks — emerges ahead of US President-elect Donald Trump’s Jan. 20 inauguration. The US charged an Iranian man last month in connection with an alleged Iranian plot to assassinate Trump. Iran has rejected the accusation.

During his first term in office, Trump embraced a “maximum pressure” campaign on Iran, imposing harsh sanctions on Tehran, its military complex, and its most lucrative economic sectors. Trump in 2018 pulled the US out of a 2015 international agreement meant to deny Tehran the ability to build nuclear weapons. In 2020 Trump was responsible for a strike in Iraq that killed top Iranian military commander Qassem Soleimani.

The post Hezbollah Aims to Rebuild Longer Term Despite Israeli Blows, US Intel Says first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

Displaced children who fled the Aleppo countryside, stand at the back of a truck in Tabqa, Syria, Dec. 4, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Orhan Qereman

Syrian rebels battled government forces and allied militia on Wednesday in villages north and east of Hama, a major city whose capture would pile pressure on President Bashar al-Assad.

The rebels have staged their biggest advance in years over the past week, seizing Aleppo — Syria’s biggest city before the war — in a lightning assault that has upended long stable frontlines and further destabilized a region already ablaze from war in Gaza.

On Wednesday, as the insurgents mounted fresh assaults around the outskirts of Hama, the most powerful rebel commander was shown on video touring Aleppo’s ancient citadel, historically a potent symbol of rule over northern Syria.

Abu Mohammed al-Golani, head of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) which was formerly an al Qaeda affiliate, was shown marching out of the citadel’s medieval gateway amid cheering supporters and escorted by masked fighters waving opposition flags.

It was a symbolic moment at a site where government forces had hung portraits of Assad when they captured the city in 2016 after a long siege, a major turning point in the war.

The loss of Aleppo last week has stunned Assad and his Iranian and Russian allies, with rebels rapidly taking a swathe of countryside around the city and pushing on to the outskirts of Hama on the road to Damascus.

UN Syria envoy Geir Pedersen warned the Security Council on Tuesday that the situation was “extremely fluid and dangerous,” adding that Syria faced danger of “further division, deterioration, and destruction.”

Syria’s civil war killed hundreds of thousands of people, sent many millions fleeing across borders, and drew in regional and global powers after erupting in 2011 in a rebellion against Assad.

Syrian state media and rebels said there was fighting on Wednesday around al-Uwayr and neighboring villages after pro-government forces had pushed back an assault overnight on Jabal Zain al-Abidin, just north of Hama.

Fighting in Uwayr would indicate rebels were advancing into areas of countryside on the eastern flank of Hama, which is one of Syria’s most important cities and has stayed in government hands throughout the conflict.

ALLIES

Moscow and Tehran, distracted by conflicts in Ukraine and elsewhere in the Middle East, have scrambled to get more support to Assad, with Russia intensifying air strikes and Iran-backed Iraqi and Afghan militia groups heading to front lines.

Moscow and Tehran have been allies of the Assad dynasty for decades and Syria remains important to both. Assad represents an important link in the network of Shi’ite groups Iran backs across the region. Russia operates a Mediterranean naval port at Tartous and has an air base at Hmeimim near Latakia.

Russian air power and Iran’s network of regional militias were vital to Damascus clawing back most of the country from 2015-20 after losing swathes of territory to rebels in the war’s early years.

Rebels and Syrian military sources both cited a combination of air strikes and the arrival of reinforcements as crucial in staving off an insurgent approach into northern Hama late on Tuesday.

Iran said on Tuesday it would consider sending forces if asked, and Russia said it would strongly support efforts to “counter terrorist groups and restore constitutional order.”

Meanwhile Assad has started a new conscription push, announcing a 50 percent increase in military pay and setting up checkpoints in Damascus and eastern Deir al-Zor signing up young men to join the army, residents said.

Syrian state media reported further arrivals of reinforcements to Hama on Wednesday.

REBELS

Golani’s appearance in Aleppo underscores the growing sway of HTS, long the most powerful faction in northwest Syria, regarded not only by Damascus and its allies but also by Western countries as a terrorist group.

HTS was originally called the Nusra Front as the main al Qaeda franchise in Syria before cutting formal ties with the global jihadist network in 2016.

The insurgents’ rapid advance over the past week has brought them new territory that they may struggle to govern, with food and fuel shortages already reported in Aleppo.

It has also led to the capture of several Syrian military bases and rebel sources said fleeing government forces had abandoned significant amounts of weapons and equipment, now in insurgent hands.

HTS fights alongside more mainstream rebel factions that are backed by Turkey.

Ankara also supports the Syrian National Army, a separate rebel grouping that holds a strip of territory along the border. It wants to keep Kurdish groups in Syria away from the frontier and to create a haven for Syrian refugees now living in Turkey.

The United States, which still has a small contingent of troops on the ground after intervening to help defeat Islamic State from 2014-2017, supports an alliance led by Syria’s main Kurdish armed group.

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Israeli football supporters are assaulted near Amsterdam Central station, in Amsterdam, Netherlands, November 8, 2024, in this still image obtained from a social media video. Photo: X/iAnnet/via REUTERS

Pogroms are events that many Jews once believed were confined to the darkest chapters of European history, relegated to memory and textbooks.

Yet, on November 7, 2024, a pogrom is precisely what we witnessed when Israeli soccer fans in Amsterdam were ambushed, chased, and beaten by organized mobs.

Dutch authorities revealed that the attack was far from spontaneous; it had been meticulously orchestrated via WhatsApp, with a group chat calling for a “Jew hunt.” Targeting Jews everywhere is exactly what former Hamas head Ismail Haniyeh meant when he called to “globalize the intifada.”

The reality is stark: Europe — a continent that once prided itself on lessons learned from its past — is now witnessing those lessons unravel as antisemitic violence surges anew.

This incident in Amsterdam, following a year of rising antisemitic incidents across Europe, should have been a loud and clear wake-up call for European leaders. Yet the response has been woefully inadequate. As was the case in the immediate days following October 7, 2023, when antisemitic crimes escalated dramatically, much of the reaction has been confined to mere condemnations.

In the Netherlands, where the memory of the Holocaust and the nation’s failure to protect its Jewish population during World War II remain a national scar, this recent wave of antisemitism feels particularly perilous. Dutch officials, including King Willem-Alexander and Amsterdam’s mayor, have expressed sorrow and regret, but the time for words has long passed.

Over the last year, we have seen a 245% increase in antisemitic incidents in the Netherlands, a staggering 1,000% rise in France, nearly 600% in the UK, and similar spikes across Europe and worldwide. This is not an isolated surge confined to one country but a dangerous new era for Jews throughout Europe.

The Dutch government — and European governments at large — must move beyond apologies. While such gestures have their place, they are insufficient in addressing the scale and urgency of this crisis.

We need action. On November 19, I joined a group of European government ministers, convened at AJC’s urging by French Minister for European Affairs Benjamin Haddad and Dutch Minister of Foreign Affairs Caspar Veldkamp, to propose urgent and immediate measures that European governments must take to protect their Jewish communities. Importantly, the group acknowledged that this meeting was merely a first step, and that much more remains to be done.

The European Union must acknowledge the unfolding crisis and elevate it to the highest priority level, including by convening an emergency meeting of European heads of state. This cannot be business as usual. Antisemitism is not a problem for Jews alone, but a societal cancer that threatens the stability, cohesion, and future of Europe itself.

Europe’s leaders must establish a comprehensive, zero-tolerance policy on antisemitism. For too long, European governments have allowed antisemitism to fester on their streets, in their universities, and within social and public institutions, creating an environment where it thrives unchecked and unpunished.

We need a unified and unyielding response, especially as anti-Zionism has become the new guise for antisemitism. The narrative that equates anti-Zionism with legitimate political discourse too often goes unchallenged, providing cover for violent rhetoric and actions against Jews.

Laws and policies across the continent must reflect that demonizing Israel is not only discriminatory but also dangerous, with immediate consequences for those who engage in this form of hate.

European leaders — with a continent-wide strategy — must also address the surge of Islamist antisemitism specifically, recognizing that it presents a direct threat to both Jewish communities and Europe at large, including Muslim communities themselves.

Islamism is a weaponized, extremist political interpretation of Islam in which anti-Jewish hate is central. It is the ideology that drives Hamas and that sadly also has footholds in some parts of European Muslim communities. Leaders must confront the complex layers of this issue, from foreign funding that promotes divisive ideologies to the radicalization occurring within communities and to social media, and take steps to ensure that antisemitic violence — under any form or justification — is eradicated.

This issue is neither recent nor isolated; it is the result of longstanding challenges with integration and the manipulation of vulnerable communities by foreign and domestic actors in mosques, through community organizations, and even at home, by extremist groups on social media and antisemitic discourse promoted on foreign TV channels. These forces exploit failures in integration policies, using divisive narratives to incite hatred against Jews under the guise of solidarity with Palestinian causes.

The attack in Amsterdam, along with the surge of Islamist antisemitism and antisemitic incidents more broadly across Europe, must be recognized as an urgent warning. Without a full-scale campaign of enforcement, protection, and justice, Europe risks seeing that the “globalization of the Intifada” not only threatens Jews, but society at large.

Antisemitism is not simply a “Jewish issue;” it is a fundamental societal issue — one that demands a whole-of-society approach.

Amsterdam cannot remain a tragic headline or a cautionary tale. This is the moment for Europe to rise to its ideals and demonstrate that it will not tolerate hatred in any form — especially not under the guise of political discourse or religious conviction.

Simone Rodan-Benzaquen is the Managing Director of AJC Europe, overseeing AJC’s offices in Berlin, Brussels, Paris, Prague, Rome, Sofia and Central Europe.

The post Following the Pogrom in Amsterdam, Europe Must Act Now to Protect Jews first appeared on Algemeiner.com.