Hizballah is not a resistance group. It is a long recognized jihad terrorist organization that was responsible, one might recall, for the 1983 massacre of 241 members of the U.S. Armed Forces. It styles itself as a resistance group against Israel, but Hizballah is ultimately self-serving. It is a parasitic pseudo-state within a state in Lebanon, more heavily armed than the Lebanese army, and the only armed group from the Lebanese Civil War that failed to disarm, in defiance of U.N. Resolution 1559 and recently ignored another call from the U.N. Secretary General to disarm.
Four Hizballah members have been indicted and are wanted by Interpol for the assassination of Rafik Hariri. How did that crime help "resist" something?
In any case, Hizballah is a proxy of Iran and Syria. The loss of a Shi'ite-controlled regime (albeit a heterodox one) would be the loss of a friendly neighbor and benefactor. Even if a Sunni regime continued to make common cause with them against Israel, the relationship would be different. "Why is the resistance group Hezbollah standing beside Syria's dictator?" by Ayman Mohyeldin for NBC News via MSNBC, March 17:
BEIRUT, Lebanon – On a freshly paved road that runs from Baalbak to Ersal in northern Lebanon stands a towering billboard.
On one half of the billboard is Syrian President Bashar Assad, in military uniform. On the other half is a portrait of Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of Hezbollah, the powerful Lebanese political and paramilitary organization that has been labeled a terrorist group by Washington.The conflict in neighboring Syria has put Hezbollah, the staunch regional resistance movement, in a tough spot. Despite praising the Arab Spring democracy movement in many other countries, Hezbollah and its leader Nasrallah are standing by the Assad regime, even as it kills thousands of its own people to preserve power.
While Hezbollah supports Assad’s regime, the broader Lebanese population is divided and hesitant to take sides. Nonetheless, there is growing concern that this distance will be increasingly difficult to maintain as the conflict spirals on.
In fact, both pro- and anti-Assad groups have traded accusations that the other is receiving material support from inside Lebanon
Rivals or bedfellows?
On the surface, Assad and Nasrallah appear to be opposites.
Assad is the president of a country that is increasingly isolated in the international community and is widely unpopular on the Arab street. His government is embattled and his grip on power challenged.
Nasrallah, on the other hands, is the head of a popular Lebanese resistance movement and a domestic political force. He enjoys widespread support on the Arab street, particularly for his staunch resistance to Israel and Western imperialism in the region.....
Would someone please hand this correspondent a style manual or something like it?
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Shi'ite logic has it that within the global Islamic community, they are a relatively small minority, and a vehemently hated one at that. Thus, Shi'ites can't survive the Sunni onslaught unless they stick together collectively to survive it.
Therefore, Ithnā'ashariyyah (Twelver Shi'ism) has to support other Shi'ite subdenominations, such as Alawi Shi'ism and Ismaili Shi'ism.(all three of them can be found in Syria) Hezbollah and the Iranian mullahs are Twelver Shi'ites who support the Alawi power base. Within the context of ME politics, it is no surprise that the Syrian Alawi have consistently supported Hezbollah in Lebanon. If the Alawi get ousted from Syria by the hands of Salafis or MB affiliate groups, Hezbollah's position in Lebanon wil crumble to dust. The common denominator among those groups is simply "preserving Shi'ite interests in the region". It is a struggle for Shi'ite survival in the region.
This NBC correspondent doesn't understand the first thing about ME politics, apparently, because he asks all the wrong questions, which are indicative of the MSM's ignorance. This so-called journalist will find himself increasingly bewildered by what's going on because he simply ignores the obvious:
This is essentially a struggle of Shi'ites vs. Sunnis, and not a struggle of "unified Muslim resistance groups" against secularist dictatorship "in order to establish democratic rule in Syria" as most journalists in the West seem to want to believe.
NBC needs to get its facts straight !