Israel’s assassinations: tactical successes, strategic blunders

On July 30, Fuad Shukr, a top deputy to Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, was targeted and killed in an Israeli bombing attack in South Beirut.

Shukr was targeted as the person responsible for the July 27 rocket attack on an Israeli military base in the Golan Heights, where an Iranian-made Falaq-1 rocket with a warhead of over 110 pounds of explosives hit a soccer field that morning in the Druze town of Majdal Shams, killing 12 children and injuring 50 others.

Hours later, Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh was assassinated by a bomb in his government-provided guest house in Tehran while attending the inauguration of the new Iranian president.

Shukr was Hezbollah’s top military commander, labeled by the U.S. as a “Specially Designated Global Terrorist.” He was tied directly to the Beirut Marine barracks bombing in 1983 (an underreported fact), which killed 241 U.S. Marines and 56 French troops. Haniyeh was the long-time political leader of Hamas and, for the past eight years, was based in Qatar.

No one in the West should lose sleep over the deaths of these two men. But despite the attacks’ intelligence and tactical successes, were they ultimately strategic blunders?

Hezbollah began its missile barrages against Israel immediately after the Hamas attack of Oct. 7. Though the missile and rocket attacks have been intense at times, there have been reasonably few casualties. Both Israel and Hezbollah were engaged in low-intensity conflict — though, as with the Majdal Shams attack, not everything goes according to plan. Importantly, Nasrallah had announced publicly that Hezbollah would hold its fire (for the time being) if there were an Israel-Hamas cease-fire.

Had Shukr been the only major assassination, there likely would have been escalation for a few days followed by a return to relative normalcy. Hezbollah, however, remains a potent threat with more than 150,000 rockets and missiles capable of striking anywhere in Israel.

Hezbollah could fire over 400 missiles a day for a year without the need for resupply. Put into context, the Iranian bombardment against Israel in April was roughly 350 missiles, rockets and drones. Imagine that every day for a year.

More importantly, the distance from South Lebanon to Haifa is under 20 miles, and to Tel Aviv about 80 miles. Israeli defense systems such as the Iron Dome or Arrow are simply not as effective against short-range rockets. (Indeed, the Iron Dome did not deploy on July 27 because the Hezbollah missiles were fired from six miles away and flight time was too short).

Though the Hezbollah threat will need to be dealt with, most Israeli strategists would have preferred time to regroup after 10 months of fighting in Gaza. The Shukr killing alone would not have set off the region.

Ismail Haniyeh had already been usurped as the leader of Hamas in Gaza by Yahya Sinwar — the sole remaining key Hamas leader in Gaza. But he was the face of Hamas to the world and in the cease-fire negotiations. Haniyeh pushed for a cease-fire — but was overruled by Sinwar (who has a vested interest in prolonged conflict).

The confluence of assassinations against the two critical arms of Iran’s “axis of resistance” (the Houthis being the third), and with the Haniyeh assassination taking place in Tehran, means that escalation is likely, not just in Gaza or Northern Israel but in the entire region. The U.S. is deploying more ships and aircraft to the region in anticipation. As we know, limited escalations (and rockets and missiles) do not always go as planned.

A hostage deal and a cease-fire — which appeared to be in cards (the Israeli prime minister notwithstanding) — along with a cease-fire with Hezbollah is a thing of the past, certainly for the short term.

A larger conflagration means no return of the hostages, no return of the 100,000 evacuees to northern of Israel, no Israeli cease-fire with Hamas or Hezbollah and heightened anxiety everywhere. The audacious assassination of Haniyeh in Tehran means that Iran (both on its own and through its proxies) will retaliate. The region, desperately in need of a respite, will have none.

There are three things we now know for certain. Haniyeh will not be able to spend the estimated $4 billion he amassed as the Hamas political leader; many more people will die in the next few weeks than needed to; and Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu and Hamas leader Sinwar are the only two who gain politically from wider conflagration in the region.

Jonathan D. Strum is an international lawyer and businessman based in Washington and the Middle East. From 1991 to 2005, he was an adjunct professor of the Israeli Legal System at Georgetown University Law Center.