What Can Saudi Arabia Really Do About Hezbollah?
Given the Iranian-backed militant group’s growing tentacles, maybe not much.
A banner bearing a portrait of Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri hangs in Beirut.
Photographer: Anwar Amro/AFP via Getty Images
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Saudi Arabia has embarked on another foreign policy adventure by intervening in Lebanon's delicate sectarian power balance to undermine Iranian-backed Hezbollah.
Yet even working with the U.S. and Israel in trying to isolate the group, the Saudis could end up being little more than a minor inconvenience for militants whose tentacles have stretched from their southern Lebanon heartlands in recent years. Hezbollah is a regional force, with combatants in Yemen, Iraq and helping President Bashar al-Assad prevail in Syria.