Lebanon’s Hizbollah, which translates as ’the party of God’, was formed as a guerrilla force to fight the Israeli occupation in 1982. The party, which started as a splinter group from the mainstream Amal Shia movement in Lebanon, was at the time closely linked to a contingent of Iranian Revolutionary guards that helped set it up and train it.

Until the mid-1980s, it remained largely decentralised with several factions operating under its umbrella. The group issued a manifesto announcing its existence in 1985 and elected its first secretary-general in 1987.

During the Israeli occupation, Hizbollah pioneered the tactic of suicide bombings in the Middle East - focused, however, on military targets. The phenonenon arguably may not have taken hold if it had not brought Hizbollah such spectacular success.

In 1983, Hizbollah was accused of bombing the US marine barracks in Beirut using a truck loaded with explosives. The suicide attack killed 241 people, followed by a similar attack on the US embassy in Beirut, was undoubtedly a factor in the US decision to pull its troops out of Lebanon in 1984. Elements of the group were also held responsible for the kidnapping and detention of US and other western hostages in Lebanon.

Hizbollah officials, however, have always argued that these attacks were the work of Islamist radicals not necessarily linked with their group - since Hizbollah had not been officially founded at the time.

After Israel pulled back its forces from Lebanon to a 7km wide strip of land, or self-styled ”security zone ” in the south of the country in 1984, Hizbollah’s armed wing - the Islamic Resistance - took on the Israeli army and and its Lebanese proxy, the South Lebanon Army, replacing the Amal militia as the main force of resistance to Israel’s occupation.

Its operations focused on attacking Israeli and SLA outposts, ambushing convoys, laying explosive devices booby-trapping cars, and launching long range mortar shells and Katyusha rockets at Israeli outposts and into Israel proper. These tactics, which produced a steady toll of Israeli casualties, were widely credited in the Arab world with forcing Israel’s eventual withdrawal from southern Lebanon in May 2000.

Political evolution

In its early days, Hizbollah wanted to transform Lebanon’s multi-confessional state into an Iranian-style Islamic state, although this idea was later abandoned in favour of a more pragmatic approach. The group had already begun to evolve into a political party before Israel’s withdrawal in 2000, and had actively participated in Lebanon’s political system since 1992. After the withdrawal of Syrian forces in 2005, Hezbollah became the most powerful military force in Lebanon in its own right and increased its political clout, gaining two seats in the Lebanese cabinet. Its provision of social services and health care have helped the party broaden its support, and it also has an influential TV station, al-Manar.

Despite a UN resolution, passed in 2004, which called for the disarming of Lebanon’s militias (as well as the withdrawal of foreign [Syrian] forces from Lebanon), Hizbollah has refused to lay down its weapons, arguing that it will not do so until the last piece of Lebanese territory held by Israel is liberated and remaining Lebanese prisoners released. Hizbollah, and the Lebanese government, maintain that a small piece of land bordering Syria, known as Shebaa Farms, that Israel still occupies is Lebanese. Israel argues that the land is part of the Golan Heights, occupied from Syria in 1967.

Hizbollah and the Palestinians

Because of its perceived success in forcing Israeli troops out of Lebanon, some of Hizbollah’s military tactics were adopted by some Palestinian groups as a model for resisting Israeli occupation. The growing co-operation between Hizbollah and Palestinian resistance groups was acknowledged by Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of Hizbollah, in 2004, when he told al-Manar TV that Hizbollah would not abandon the fight against ”the Zionist enterprise ”, which it would fight ”openly ” and ”clandestinely ”. Sayyed Nasrallah, however, has also repeatedly said that Hizbollah’s fight with Israel extends only to Lebanese territory.

Hizbollah since the 2006 Lebanon War

In July 2006, following the capture of two of its soldiers and missile attacks on the northern part of its country, Israel launched air and sea strikes against Hizbollah. Israeli ground troops entered Lebanon in August, and after 33 days of fighting a truce was declared. The war was regarded by many in the Arab world as a victory for Hizbollah, and there were calls in Israel for the resignation of Ehud Olmert, prime minister, over his handling of the campaign.

In recent years “the Islamic Resistance of Lebanon”, as the military wing of Hizbollah is known, has focused on re-arming itself in anticipation of further conflict with Israel. Nasrallah himself has promised “a war that will change the face of the entire region” in response to any attack. According to a late 2007 report to the United Nations Security Council it has now reached pre-war levels of military capability.

After the war, Hizbollah and its Shia allies demanded a greater say in government and stepped up their opposition to the coalition of Sunni, Druze and Christians supporting the western-backed government, with a campaign of strikes and protests.

Disputes over the presidential succession, with the government favouring army chief Michel Suleiman and Hizbollah opposing the appointment, have further inflamed tensions. In May 2008 Hizbollah captured parts of Beirut, sparking fears of a possible civil war.