While the ceasefire in Lebanon between the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and Shia militia Hezbollah, which went into effect at 04:00 local time on 27 November 2024, appears to be mostly holding in spite of limited strikes contravening the agreement, the effects of the IDF campaign in Lebanon are having ramifications on the wider Middle East region.
Most notably, a surprise Syrian rebel offensive, led by the once al-Qaeda-affiliated Jabhat al-Nusra, rebranded as Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), took Aleppo, Syria’s second-largest city, on 29 November and put the Syrian regime of Bashar al-Assad back on the back foot.
The significant degradation of Hezbollah’s combat capabilities, which had bolstered the Assad regime in conjunction with Russian and Iranian support but were substantially withdrawn to face the IDF, clearly gave HTS a window of opportunity to strike, which it has exploited to extensive effect. As of 2 December, Syrian rebels led by HTS had moved beyond Aleppo to push into several towns in the countryside near Syria’s fourth largest city, Hama.
Meanwhile, Russian air assets have continued to target the Syrian rebel advance while Russia’s ground forces in Syria have been forced to withdraw from Hama and other positions to regroup at Hmeimim Air Base, near Syria’s Mediterranean coast, from where Russian air attacks against the rebels are directed. Moscow thus finds itself engaged in a second active combat front in addition to its offensive in eastern Ukraine, where Russian forces had made incremental yet costly gains over the last few months.
The Lebanon ceasefire agreement stipulates that Israel must withdraw all its forces from southern Lebanon, meaning that the only armed groups present south of the Litani River should be the Lebanese Army and UN peacekeeping forces. Under the terms of the agreement, the Lebanese Army has since begun to ramp up its presence in south Lebanon, although the extent to which the Lebanese military, underfunded and with outdated equipment, can reassert control in southern Lebanon, and thus reduce the extent to which Hezbollah can target Israel from Lebanese territory, remains to be seen.
Prior to the ceasefire coming into effect the IDF conducted some of the most intensive bombardments since they entered Lebanon on 1 October 2024, targeting the Hezbollah leadership and notably claiming to have destroyed Hezbollah’s largest missile production site.
More than 3,500 Lebanese citizens have been killed by the Israeli offensive, while well over a million were forced to flee their homes.
As for the situation in Syria, the apparently astonishing gains made by the HTS-led rebels will no doubt face a counter-offensive probably supported by brutal and indiscriminate Russian bombing sorties. Yet the HTS leadership has sought to temper its previous jihadist links in an attempt to appeal for wider backing. Videos have been posted showing rebel leaders urging their fighters to respect the non-Islamist communities whose streets they have taken over.
However, there remain a number of other military powers in Syria. Most of the country’s northeast is controlled by the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), while northern sections of the country are controlled by Turkish and Turkish-aligned rebel forces. There are also around 900 US personnel still in Syria, mostly in the northeast in support of the SDF, while some are supporting the Free Syrian Army at the al-Tanf garrison in southeast Syria.
Assad’s government forces, on the other hand, still control the majority of central and southern Syria, with the country’s capital, Damascus, safely in government control in the southwest.
Given the HTS’s lack of air power, much of how the future will go will likely depend on the extend to which Russian President Vladimir Putin is prepared to double down on defending his last Middle East client state, in the form of the Assad regime, while still retaining the capacity to try and make gains in Ukraine.
