Will Hezbollah enter the Israel-Hamas conflict or not?

Members of Hezbollah take part in the funeral of Hezbollah member Abbas Shuman
Members of Hezbollah take part in the funeral of Hezbollah member Abbas Shuman
Reuters

It’s not quite the $64 million question, but it sure is the “100,000 rockets-and-missiles” question, as that’s the estimated size of the powerful Lebanese militant group’s current arsenal.

Hezbollah, which is backed by Iran and has close ties with Hamas, has threatened an “earthquake” if Israel launches a full-scale ground invasion of the Gaza Strip as part of the ongoing response to Hamas’s Oct. 7 terrorist rampage in southern Israel. And recently, Hezbollah and Israeli forces have exchanged a patter of cross-border fire, while civilians on both sides of the frontier have been evacuated.

Why would Hezbollah get involved in the conflict? It wouldn’t be to defeat Israel militarily, something that even the powerfully armed Hezbollah has no realistic chance of doing. Rather, the aim would be to draw Israel into a conflict in the north that makes it impossible for the Israel Defense Forces to fully focus on destroying Hamas in the south. Keeping Hamas afloat is an important objective for the broader, Iran-backed anti-Israel axis in the region, according to Firas Maksad, a senior fellow at the Middle East Institute in Washington, DC, who has studied Hezbollah for years.

“If there were no longer a Palestinian component of this axis,” he says, “Hezbollah itself would become much more exposed and at risk with Israel.”

But it’s a trickier calculus than you might think. Any conflict would risk a crippling backlash from Israel that could increase the suffering of millions of Lebanese already mired in a years-long economic crisis. Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu drove that point home over the weekend, warning of “devastation” if Hezbollah moves in. Since Hezbollah’s political wing has seats in the Lebanese parliament, this is something the group has to consider alongside the regional and strategic considerations.

“The most ideal situation for Hezbollah,” says Maksad, “is to be wielding the threat of force against Israel without actually having to use it.”


For more information about Hezbollah, check out our primer here.

More from GZERO Media

Russian President Vladimir Putin could talks with President Donald Trump as early as this week. Artem Priakhin/SOPA Images via Reuters Connect
Artem Priakhin/SOPA Images via Reuters Connect

US President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin will discuss America’s 30-day ceasefire proposal this week after Ukraine endorsed the plan last Tuesday but Putin torpedoed it with a list of conditions.

President Donald Trump looks on as military strikes are launched against Yemen's Iran-aligned Houthis over the group's attacks against Red Sea shipping, at an unspecified location in this handout image released March 15, 2025.

White House/Handout via REUTERS

The United States launched widespread strikes on the Iran-backed Houthis in Yemen on Saturday, killing 31 people and injuring another 101 — mostly women and children — as it targeted military sites and a power station in the rebel group’s southwest stronghold.

President Donald Trump speaks to reporters before boarding Air Force One as he departs from Joint Base Andrews in Maryland, on March 14, 2025.

REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque

On Saturday, a judge pulled the plug on President Trump's plans to expel Venezuelans supposedly linked to gangs, temporarily blocking the White House from using a law from 1798 to do so. The judge ordered the administration to turn around any planes that were already en route, but more than 200 Venezuelans reportedly landed in El Salvador after the ruling.

Listen: In seven short weeks, the Trump administration has completely reshaped US foreign policy and upended trade alliances. Will China benefit from US retrenchment and increasing global uncertainty, or will its struggling economy hold it back? On the GZERO World Podcast, Bill Bishop, a China analyst and author of the Sinocism newsletter, joins Ian Bremmer for a wide-ranging conversation about China—its domestic priorities, global administration, and whether America’s retreat from global commitments is opening new doors for Beijing.

German Chancellor-in-waiting Friedrich Merz speaks to the media after he reached an agreement with the Greens on a massive increase in state borrowing just days ahead of a parliamentary vote next week, in Berlin, Germany, on March 14, 2025.
REUTERS/Axel Schmidt

Germany’s election-winning center-right Christian Democratic Union/Christian Social Union, led by Friedrich Merz, and the Social Democrats have reached a preliminary agreement with the Green Party on a deal to exclude defense spending from the country’s constitutional debt break and establish a dedicated $545 billion fund for infrastructure investments.

A Russian army soldier walks along a ruined street of Malaya Loknya settlement, which was recently retaken by Russia's armed forces in the course of Russia-Ukraine conflict in the Kursk region, on March 13, 2025.

Russian Defence Ministry/Handout via REUTERS

The Russian leader has conditions of his own for any ceasefire with Ukraine, and he also wants a meeting with Donald Trump.

Mahmoud Khalil speaks to members of the media about the Revolt for Rafah encampment at Columbia University on June 1, 2024.

REUTERS/Jeenah Moon

The court battle over whether the US can deport Mahmoud Khalil, the 30-year-old Palestinian-Algerian activist detained in New York last Saturday, began this week in Manhattan. Khalil, an outspoken activist for Palestinian rights at Columbia University, was arrested Saturday at his apartment in a university-owned building at Columbia University by Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers, and he is now being held in an ICE detention center in Louisiana.