When Hezbollah started fighting on behalf of President Bashar Al Assad at the onset of the Syrian civil war in 2011, the Iran-backed Shiite group sought to keep a low profile while regular forces flew the national flag and took credit for capturing rebel areas. Covertly, the group had long been given free access to the port of Latakia, rebuilding its military inventory in the wake of the 2006 war with Israel.
This maritime supply line, now dubbed the Syrian express, was complemented by an overland route that allowed their weapons stockpile in Lebanon to swell from perhaps 15,000 rockets in 2006 to as many as 150,000. Heavy weapons, including lethal Konkurs anti-tank missiles – recently captured in large numbers by the Israelis in south Lebanon – also came via the Syrian military from Russian manufacturers.
These now form part of the infantry arsenal that is vital for the group's strength in southern Lebanon. There, they are powerful and influential. Hezbollah has given Iran an arc of control extending from Baghdad to Beirut. Its presence in Syria, now challenged by an Israeli air campaign, is crucial to enforcing the Iranian influence in the country and maintaining military supplies and strategic depth in Lebanon, where Hezbollah has been fighting Israel in a ground war since October.
But the civil war in majority-Sunni Syria moved Hezbollah out of the shadows. In the central city of Al Qusayr near the Lebanese border, Shiite flags with the inscription “Oh Hussein” went up on several mosques after Hezbollah defeated Sunni rebels in 2013.