Hezbollah, Part 1: Origins and Challenges
Mohammad Harfoush looks at Hezbollah, one of Lebanon’s most polarizing organizations, in part one of a survey of the factors that led to the movement's formation and its present status in Lebanese society and politics.
Hezbollah is considered the most influential and widespread among Islamic parties and movements in Lebanon and the broader Middle East. It is a party that cannot be compared to any other contemporary political Islamist movement, be it fundamentalist or revivalist. Hezbollah's beginnings, discourse, programs, agendas and goals are unlike any others.
As a result of Hezbollah's political transformation, coupled with its long history of resisting Israel, the organization has taken on a number of traits that differentiate it from other movements, with its fame spread beyond Lebanon to Arab and Islamist circles abroad. Despite this, its apparent abandonment of the exclusionary political tone that characterized its discourse for most of the past twenty-five years was not enough, until now, to guarantee its full assimilation into the Lebanese political arena, characterized by complicated religious, sectarian and political pluralism.
Hezbollah as born from a number of different Islamic factions professing a variety of alliances and affiliations. Some came from the Amal Movement, while others espoused the ideologies and philosophies of Imam Sayyed Musa al-Sadr. Some were influenced by the success of the Islamic revolution in Iran, while still others were swayed by prevalent activities taking place in neighborhoods and mosques.
The Israeli invasion of Lebanon on June 3, 1982 — at a time when Lebanese Islamist dignitaries were attending an Islamic conference in Tehran on the International Day for the Oppressed — sparked the first attempt at creating a resistance movement. When news of the invasion reached attendees, Iran immediately launched an initiative, the first step of which was to send a delegation to Syria to discuss with officials there the possibility of offering the Lebanese support in resisting the invasion. The Iranian delegation received Syrian approval for troops from the Iranian Revolutionary Guard to cross Syrian territory and enter Lebanon to take part in the conflict.
