Is Israel-Hezbollah war unavoidable?

Israel’s foreign minister Israel Katz said this week that a decision on “all-out war” with Hezbollah in southern Lebanon is coming soon. 

His comment came as the head of Lebanon’s Hezbollah terror group Hassan Nasrallah this week threatened “No place in Israel will be safe” if war breaks out on Israel’s northern border. Hezbollah also released a video detailing targets in Haifa and threatened to attack Cyprus if it allowed Israel to use its airspace.

Hezbollah has been attacking northern Israel since October 8, leading to Israeli reprisals and an escalating conflict Israel has increasingly warned could spark open war. So, is war inevitable?

Not a question of if, but when
Dr Omer Dostri, Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security, Jerusalem Post

The State of Israel has no choice other than to embark on a large-scale and comprehensive war to defeat Hezbollah in order to provide security to its citizens, change the strategic picture, and reduce the threats against the state. This is as opposed to a limited military operation aimed at deterrence, such as in the second Lebanon War.

We cannot accept a strategic situation in which a terrorist organisation leads to the mass evacuation of approximately 80,000 residents from their homes in the north. Hezbollah is currently the most serious threat to the State of Israel, bar Iran. If Israel does not manage to address this threat immediately, it will receive an 'October 7' in the North in a few years, after Hezbollah consolidates and re-establishes itself on the northern border.

Therefore, Israel must take advantage of the current security situation, the international legitimacy of a future response given Hezbollah's incessant attacks, the Israeli evasion of escalation so far in order to exhaust all diplomatic options, and the fact that Hezbollah cannot strategically and operationally surprise Israel at the border at this current time. The Israeli south is also in a state of war, and many reserve forces are mobilised. The army is prepared and ready regarding military skills and exercises.