What does the defeat of Lebanese Hezbollah and the battle of Aleppo mean for Yemen? (Special Analysis)

Hours after the ceasefire between the Lebanese Hezbollah, the main element in the Shiite Iranian axis, and the Israeli occupation, the Syrian opposition factions launched an attack on Hezbollah forces, the Syrian regime, and Iranian militias west of the Aleppo countryside, achieving victories that have not happened in years, and began to approach the strategic Syrian city of Aleppo. The importance of Aleppo lies in the fact that it contains a quarter of Syria's population and a third of its economy, and the battles are still raging.

Syria represents one of the most important arenas of influence resulting from the defeat suffered by Hezbollah (although the party sees itself as having won that war) in southern Lebanon, including its acceptance of separating the southern Lebanese front from the Gaza Strip, which Hassan Nasrallah said before his assassination would not stop until the aggression on Gaza stops.

A writer for the Lebanese newspaper Al-Akhbar, which expresses the party’s views, and the Iranian-affiliated Al-Mayadeen channel, admitted that the truce in southern Lebanon expresses the collapse of the balances that have been in place for more than two decades, specifically since the Israeli withdrawal from the south in 2000, including the collapse of the unity of the arenas, which is also the declared Israeli goal of the occupation’s acceptance of a ceasefire there.

He also admitted that the occupation now feels that Hezbollah is out of the equation of confrontation between the occupation and Iran over influence in the Arab regions that are violated by both of them. He expects that the Lebanese party will drown in the internal Lebanese contradictions with its allies and opponents alike.

The blows that Hezbollah suffered made it much weaker in the face of the Israeli occupation compared to what it was before the Al-Aqsa Flood, but this weakness has not yet been tested in the face of the Arabs.

However, there have been major changes in the party’s structure over the past decades, according to Yassin al-Hajj Saleh, who said, “The structural area of Iranian control is the Levant and the Arabian Peninsula, while its confrontation with Israel is incidental. Hezbollah’s confrontation with Israel was not incidental like Iran’s, especially when Israel occupied Lebanese territory.”

He added, "But today, since the beginning of his Syrian adventure, his confrontation with Israel has become more casual, while his inclusion in the Iranian strategic planning is structural... and the only determinant of his movement is not Lebanon, nor Jerusalem, nor Palestine, but rather Iran's security." Hence the importance of following up on the expected effects of Hezbollah's decline in the entire region.

Therefore, the rise of the Houthi role in the Iranian strategy may constitute a fundamental pillar in an attempt by Tehran to maintain its influence and its agents, whom it considers its first line of defense, especially after the emergence of its clear weakness in direct confrontation with the occupation through the ballistic missile program and conventional weapons. However, Iran is facing the repercussions of the clear collapse of its strategy based on deterrence through armed agents in the Arab Levant in the name of the Palestinian cause.

According to Dr. Firas Elias, an expert on Iranian affairs, Hezbollah’s value “was strategically manifested by its presence on the border with Israel. Today, after the ceasefire agreement and the party’s retreat beyond the Litani River, the party no longer has a clear influence, neither on the unilateral level nor on the level of the axis of resistance,” adding that this could change the nature of the party itself.

Elias said via the "X" platform: "If this agreement becomes a permanent situation between Israel and Lebanon, and results in the process of demarcating the borders between the two parties, then the party will transform from a resistance party to a party that adopts the culture of resistance, like other resistance parties that were ended by wars."

Commenting on a question about the importance of the Houthis near the Saudi border, Tehran's main opponent in the Arab Levant, he pointed out that today, after Hezbollah was removed from the equation, the Houthis have become the most capable of Iran's other allies.

In the same context, Yemen's ambassador to Britain, Dr. Yassin Saeed Noman, says, "What can be focused on from the rubble left behind by the military confrontation, and the negative positions of the Iranian regime towards what the so-called "Axis of Resistance" system was exposed to (...) is that this project, which was designed and financed by Iran to serve its strategic interests aimed at establishing itself as a regional power, taken into account internationally, alongside Israel, has come to an end."

“It is necessary to remind ourselves that there is a link in the project that Iran is betting on, which is to cling to the Houthis as an alternative equivalent, which it will cling to and maneuver with, which is what the project’s militias concluded in their discussions some time ago, by turning Yemen into a logistical base to compensate for the dynamics and components of the project that it lost in other important areas, by focusing and re-injecting the capabilities and experts of Hezbollah and other militias into the areas of Houthi influence in Yemen,” Noman added on his Facebook page.

The Yemeni ambassador stressed that "the assessment based on the belief that breaking Hezbollah in Lebanon will negatively affect the Houthis in Sana'a requires a re-reading of the scene in light of some data, little of which has emerged so far, but which is extremely important for re-evaluating the results in a realistic manner."

The re-eruption of the conflict in Aleppo and the opposition’s shift from defense to attack after many years is crucial for the Yemeni front against the Houthis. The victory of Iran, Russia, Hezbollah, and the Syrian regime over the opposition in Aleppo 2015-2018 led to a massive shift in the balance of power in the Arab Levant, including Yemen, with Iran directing all its military capabilities and allied militias from Iraq, Syria, and Hezbollah to support the Houthis in Yemen.

Houthi media and activists on social media published extensive news about the war raging in Aleppo on Wednesday, describing it as a war against Gaza and revenge against the United States and Israel from the Iranian axis. However, through their official spokesman, Mohammed Abdul Salam, they said that they trust the decisions of the Lebanese Hezbollah leaders, whoever they are, and that the party rose after the assassination of its leaders, and that it bore the responsibility of supporting Gaza throughout the past period.

The Houthi statement did not indicate their position on whether or not to continue their naval attacks. This may be subject to current discussions with Iran, and the position may be announced by Abdul-Malik al-Houthi, who has pledged in many speeches to continue the attacks until the Israeli aggression on the Gaza Strip stops in the coming days.

As for Mohammed Al-Maqalih, a former member of the Supreme Revolutionary Committee that managed the areas controlled by the Houthis in 2015, he suggested that the attacks launched by the Houthis against the Israeli occupation and maritime navigation vessels should stop and that preparations should be made for the post-war phase after Hezbollah and Lebanon are out of the war equation.

The collapse in the Iranian regional power balance with Israel coincides with a limited change in the US position on Houthi naval attacks and the continuation of US aircraft launching raids on Houthi naval capabilities, including weapons depots, launch pads, and air surveillance systems.

But the Saudi position is still insisting on negotiating with the Houthis according to the road map that emerged in very different circumstances before the outbreak of the war in the Gaza Strip.

But Hanin Ghaddar, a senior researcher at the Washington Institute in Lebanon, said in televised statements that she expects Trump to conclude new agreements with Iran that will not negatively affect the region, in addition to the fact that the ceasefire plan in southern Lebanon also includes removing Hezbollah and Iran from Syria, so that Hezbollah does not rearm from Iran.

To counter Iran's shift to focus on Yemen, Yemeni researcher Ayman Nabil suggests that political, cultural and resistance elites in countries where Iran has invaded and wreaked havoc should now begin serious negotiations with Iran that will achieve results.

“Now, and only now, can negotiations between us and Iran lead to results,” Nabil said on the X platform. “If every Arab society whose blood is tainted by the Iranian regime had cohesive popular-political elites, it would be possible to engage in negotiations that pressure the regime in Iran, exploiting its need for compromise in its difficult situation, and our need to overcome the ordeal and gather our scattered parts.”

The Yemeni government has not announced any new strategy for confrontation, and through its official system, it continues to fail in remaining in exile, disrupt state institutions, and drown in the conflicts of its leaders over scarce resources, which it says daily.

In contrast, the Yemeni opposition political parties and social forces are drowning in their attempts to enter into new partnerships with the collapsed government without representing a real opposition to the government that works to strengthen the government’s position and produces alternative plans and opinions that suit the new local and regional developments.