the campaign to reshape the Middle East

For several years, the Israeli military worked slab-by-slab on an ambitious project: a huge, seven metre-high concrete wall to protect its northern border villages from Hizbollah militants in Lebanon.

The wall, which was to one day stretch across much of the 130km frontier, fitted neatly into Israel’s containment strategy. Together with reinforced barriers around the Gaza Strip, in the West Bank, along the occupied Golan Heights and the Egyptian border, the idea was to keep enemies out and reinforce Israelis’ sense of security.

But in the year since Hamas broke through the Gaza barrier to launch its October 7 attack, the Lebanon wall — like Israel’s doctrine — has become a relic. Across the Middle East, Israel now sees an opportunity to take the fight to its foes and attempt to impose a new order: what Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu calls a “strategic turn” to change “the security reality in our region for generations to come”.

The imposing wall is now punched through with holes to allow Israeli forces on to the battlefields of southern Lebanon.

“Israel is not passive any more, we are active, we are initiating and we will initiate in the future — preventive wars are not a sin any more,” said Yaakov Amidror, a retired Israeli general at the Washington-based Jewish Institute for National Security of America think-tank. “We will prevent any attempt by any of our enemies to be the monster near our borders.”

Battlefield gains have buoyed Israel’s confidence, reinforcing its sense of military superiority as the initial war aims of eliminating Hamas and freeing hostages held in Gaza morphed into a multifront conflict against Iran and its proxies.

Netanyahu, considered risk averse before Hamas’s attack, told the Knesset last week that Israel’s strategy was to “dismantle” Iran’s so-called axis of resistance, which includes Hizbollah, Hamas, the Houthis in Yemen and Shia militias in Iraq and Syria, all of whom have fired at Israel over the past year.

Netanyahu cited Israel’s attack on Iranian military targets last month — retaliation for an Iranian missile barrage at Israel — as an example of this “strategic turn”. It was the first time Israeli forces had acknowledged a direct strike on their arch-foe, and followed a month of intense Israeli military activity across the region.

After a year of tit-for-tat cross-border fire, Israel dramatically expanded its offensive against Hizbollah, pounding targets across Lebanon and launching the first land invasion of its northern neighbour in almost two decades. Israeli forces also in recent weeks mounted a ferocious new offensive in northern Gaza, launched air strikes in Syria and bombed Houthi targets in Yemen.

The thinking in Israel is that by severely degrading Hamas and Hizbollah, it has weakened the Islamic republic’s frontline defences against the Jewish state.

Amir Avivi, a retired general and founder of the Israel Defense and Security Forum, said Israel “understands that we have a historical opportunity to not only eradicate Hamas, but also dismantle Hizbollah” and strike Iran.

“Iran lost its strategic depth . . . and this is the moment to really take them out of the equation,” said Avivi, who is close to the far-right government. “When [Netanyahu] talks about total victory today this . . . is about really bringing down the Shia axis.”

He predicted a “long campaign”. “It’s not going to stop until this [Iranian] regime is on its knees, just like Hizbollah,” Avivi said.

One critical question is whether Israel will attempt to strike Iran’s nuclear sites, with Netanyahu saying last week that the Israeli security services’ “supreme objective” was to prevent Iran attaining a nuclear weapon.

Avivi said Israel’s prediction was that a cornered Iran would weaponise its programme. “Either they become nuclear or we destroy them,” he said.

Experts have long said Israel would require US assistance to seriously damage the republic’s atomic facilities, but the October 26 direct strikes on Iran, consisting of about 100 Israeli warplanes and airborne refuellers, may have demonstrated greater capabilities than previously believed.

“They were just able to carry out . . . this long-range strike operation without our refuellers,” one former US defence official said. “They still need heavy bombs, but if the air space isn’t contested [over Iran] then the Israelis may be able to take a few swings at it.”

The sense of military ascendancy is also shaping Israel’s approach to US-led diplomatic efforts to end the conflicts in Gaza and Lebanon.

Netanyahu refuses to cede to Hamas’s demands to agree a permanent ceasefire and withdraw Israeli troops from Gaza to secure the release of hostages. And he is insisting Israel retains the right to unilaterally enforce any agreement that would lead to Hizbollah withdrawing from southern Lebanon.

“We understand we’re in a unique opportunity — we have superiority over Hizbollah. They can’t resist,” defence minister Yoav Gallant told the Financial Times. “Their ability to defend themselves in southern Lebanon is collapsing.”

“Unlike [in the last war] in 2006, today Israel’s military achievements put us in a strong position to demand Hizbollah to push back its forces.”

There are also signs that Syria, where Iranian forces and Hizbollah fighters have been deployed to support Bashar al-Assad’s regime during Syria’s civil war, is in Israel’s sights. Israel, which has long launched sporadic strikes on Iranian- and Hizbollah-linked targets, has expanded its attacks over the past year.

“We cannot accept the Iranian military in Syria,” Gallant said. “We need to stop the transfer of weapons, especially powerful weapons, from Iran through Syria and Iraq to Lebanon.”

Israel’s military offensives have reshaped the region, with devastating consequences for millions of Palestinian and Lebanese people. Much of Gaza has been rendered uninhabitable, while more than 90 per cent of the strip’s 2.3mn population has been driven from their homes.

More than 1mn people have also been displaced in Lebanon as Israel’s relentless bombing campaign destroys swaths of the south and the eastern Bekaa Valley.

Michael Wahid Hanna, US programme director at the Crisis Group think-tank, said the Middle East appeared to be in a “new, open-ended phase of regionalised conflict” as Israel “senses an opportunity” to reshape the region to its liking.

“Those efforts could accelerate even more if [former US president Donald] Trump is elected,” he said. “This will entail increased displacement and settlement, reoccupation and annexation.”

The costs for Israel had been “manageable” in terms of casualties and reputation, Hanna added, despite “some corners of the world viewing them as some kind of rogue state”.

“As long as they have the full backing of the US, and much of Europe, with gritted teeth, they can get away with it,” Hanna said. But “the brutality of the war and the tenor of public opinion will mean that Arab relations remain mostly very cold”.

One question that remains mostly unaddressed by Israel’s leaders, though, is what will come next, and when.

Amidror, who is close to Netanyahu, said he expected Israel to continue fighting in Gaza throughout next year to “clean” the strip “of all the [Hamas] remnants”.

Netanyahu insists Israel will maintain overall security control over Gaza, with or without a ceasefire.

Amidror said the dynamic would be akin to areas of the West Bank nominally under Palestinian administration, where Israeli forces strike suspected militants at will. In Lebanon too, he predicted, Israel would continue to hit Hizbollah targets.

Asked about the risks of perennial conflict, Amidror said: “We don’t buy these stories any more. It’s the same story we were told inside and outside Israel before October 7.”

Yet other Israelis worry their country is on the path of endless war, with no clear strategy on how to translate battlefield successes into lasting political gains, fighting ideological enemies that will keep going even in their weakened state.

“Victory or winning, I’m not sure you can even use these terms regarding this war,” said Michael Milshtein, a former Israeli intelligence officer. “This is the most difficult thing: every day we see military achievements, killing [Hamas leader Yahya] Sinwar, destroying Hizbollah [infrastructure], but when will we see the end; when can we plan something?”

Cartography by Alan Smith, Cleve Jones and Steven Bernard