Hezbollah Opens a Second Front and Israel Gets the Blame

While the question of whether or when war between Israel and Iran would break out, so too was the question of whether Iran’s proxy Hezbollah would join the fight and act as a layer of protection for the Iranian regime.

Since Hezbollah and Israel agreed to a ceasefire in November 2024, the terrorist organization has worked to rebuild its infrastructure and regain its status as Iran’s strongest terrorist proxy in the Middle East. In doing so, it has consistently and relentlessly broken the ceasefire, committing at least 1,925 violations up to near the end of 2025.

The threat posed by Hezbollah has been greatly diminished after the year-long war, as Israel destroyed much of its infrastructure and forces, thus stripping the terrorist organization of its ability to conduct large-scale operations it was once capable of. But the danger persists.

Hezbollah still maintains considerable political influence inside Lebanon, which results in direct leverage over policies and daily life in Lebanese society. It has effectively been recognized as a state within a state, threatening the very existence of the Lebanese state itself. For this reason, Lebanon has failed to fully disarm Hezbollah, despite the Lebanese Army’s claim that the first stage in the process was completed.

Since its inception, Iran has funded Hezbollah, making the organization the most prominent proxy in Iran’s regional power structure. In fact, Hassan Nasrallah, the late leader who was killed in an Israeli airstrike in September 2024, had referred to himself as a “soldier” in the Iranian regime’s army. Thus, Israeli and US intentions to collapse the Iranian regime are a direct threat to the very foundation on which Hezbollah is built.

Despite repeated warnings by Israel not to join the fight (as well as the pleas from Lebanon’s fragile government), in the early hours of Monday morning, Hezbollah fired rockets towards Israel. This marked the first time since the full-scale war with Hezbollah that the terrorist organization fired rockets into Israeli territory.

Similar to Hezbollah’s reaction of launching what it called a “solidarity” front for Hamas following the attacks of October 7, 2023, Hezbollah claimed that the firing of rockets into Israel was “revenge for the blood of the Supreme Leader of the Muslims, Ali Khamenei,” who was killed in an Israeli airstrike on the first day of the war.

Despite even Hezbollah acknowledging it was the party to fire first, the narrative in the media reversed the order of events, referring to Israel’s “attack” on Lebanon as the cause for the widening conflict.

Yet the timeline of events remains abundantly clear: Hezbollah opened a second front in the war — breaking the ceasefire to do so — by firing at least six rockets and two drones.

Immediately after Hezbollah joined the war by attacking Israel, the IDF responded with a series of strikes on Hezbollah targets across Lebanon, including targeting senior leadership. While Israel has responded to previous ceasefire violations, the firing of rockets into Israeli territory crossed a clearly defined red line set by the IDF. As a result, Israel initiated direct kinetic action aimed at further degrading Hezbollah’s operational capabilities and deterring escalation.

Shifting the attention away from Hezbollah’s initiating actions and instead framing Israel’s response as the catalyst for escalation obscures the reality of the war Israel is now fighting on two fronts.

Although the dangers posed by the Iranian regime have been the primary target of the war, Israel’s commitment to deterring and removing the threat of any terrorist actor remains steadfast. When media coverage downplays Hezbollah’s responsibility, Israel’s defensive measures risk being perceived as unprovoked aggression. This reframing not only distorts the sequence of events but also seeks to undermine Israel’s ability to maintain deterrence.

In this war, accurate reporting of terrorist organizations and the sequence of events is not optional — it is essential to understanding the realities shaping the conflict and the decisions that follow.

The author is a contributor to HonestReporting, a Jerusalem-based media watchdog with a focus on antisemitism and anti-Israel bias — where a version of this article first appeared.