Those Whom the Gods Wish to Destroy, They First Make Mad !

Who can believe that the Shiite community—especially that of South Lebanon—will withstand this perfidious war of attrition? Day after day, Israeli strikes taunt it, challenge it to retaliate, and impose a hellish pace. If, at the outset, Hezbollah’s restraint was synonymous with self-control, that is no longer the case. And the Party of God can no longer claim to be exercising self-discipline after a year of provocation. Hence the question of whether it will finally choose the path of confrontation or yield to the demands of disarmament ?

Will the perseverance of the israeli army ultimately overcome the legendary patience of civilians? For discontent is rising among an exasperated Twelver population. Worked up to a fever pitch, it sees no way out of this conflict, nor any benefit in it. And who could still deceive it when the evidence is so clear: the day after October 7, it was sacrificed on the altar of Palestine, and now, a year later, it is immolated on the altar of Iran’s nuclear ambitions.

Hezbollah will have to answer to its own supporters, who stood by it in difficult times. Sooner or later, it will have to give an account. After all, by accepting the terms of the ceasefire, it backpedaled. It can no longer claim the mantle of resistance, so much is it entrenched in retreat and contraction.

“Per un pugno di dollari”

This low-intensity war—long-term nonetheless—is exhausting, if only for the mental health of civilian populations. Disarray and anxiety in the face of the imbalance of forces engaged! It is practically a game of clay-pigeon shooting, where the aggressor risks nothing, while victims fall at a steady rate and the South’s communication routes are rendered impassable by the threat from the sky.

Do you think there will long remain recruits willing to go to their deaths “per un pugno di dollari” at the end of the month? As a matter of fact, that is exactly what is happening. Israel can strike Lebanon without fearing reprisals against Nahariya, Metulla, or Kiryat Shmona. In this sense, it is the indeed the Party of God that guarantees Israel’s impunity while sending its fighters to almost certain death in perilous zones. And all this under the pretext of rebuilding its arsenal and its military capabilities!

When will the great reckoning come?

This situation cannot go on. Grumbling and dissent within Shiite circles are beginning to gain media attention. Ismail al-Najjar, a YouTuber known for his angry tirades, exclaimed very recently: what is Hezbollah waiting for to take up the gauntlet Israel has thrown in its face? If it backs away once again from confrontation, all that will remain is to “recite the Fatiha over it”. In other words, its popularity is finished. And in his bluster, this imprecator went on: it is too much humiliation! What does a general conflagration matter, or even a catastrophic end?

So then, let us hasten the Twilight of the Gods and let the ravaging fire devastate the entire region! That said, it is quite possible that certain mindsets lend themselves to an apocalyptic vision of the end times—a vision that would hasten the birth of a regenerated world, a catharsis bearing the promise of collective redemption.

Such thinking may make sense for adherents of millenarianism!

But since we are compatriots, and since we share, to some extent, the same Lebanese destiny, allow us a brief interruption: we did not sign a Faustian pact with Mephistopheles—any more than with a Pasdaran or a Houthi.

So please, do not drag us down with you in your fall!