US intelligence officials say that the Hezbollah terror group in Lebanon, which was significantly compromised militarily by Israel in the recent war, is already engaged in rehabilitating its forces and replenishing its weapons caches, Reuters reported.

The officials said that Hezbollah still poses a long-term threat to the US and its regional allies.

Four sources updated on US intelligence told Reuters that even while the war between Israel and Lebanon was still ongoing, Hezbollah began to recruit new members and was assessing ways to rearm through domestic production and by smuggling materials through Syria.

Israel has been trying to halt Hezbollah’s capabilities to rebuild, carrying out strikes on rocket launchers in Lebanon, bombing border crossings with Syria, and even forcing a suspected Iranian arms plane to fly back over Syria.

US intelligence agencies assess that Hezbollah has lost over half of its weapons stockpiles and thousands of terrorists in the war in Israel, decreasing Iran’s overall military capabilities to its lowest point in decades.

But the sources said that Hezbollah still has thousands of short-range rockets in Lebanon and will try to rebuild via weapons factories in neighboring countries.

US officials are especially concerned about Hezbollah’s access to Syria, where the civil war was recently rekindled. For many years, Syria served as a haven and transport hub for Hezbollah, with military equipment and weapons passing from Iran to Iraq, through Syria and into Lebanon.

The US is applying pressure on Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to thwart Hezbollah operations on Syrian soil. The US and UAE have even discussed removing sanctions on Assad if he unravels his ties to Iran and cuts off weapons routes to Hezbollah.

However, for now, US officials believe that Hezbollah’s breakdown indicates a growing weakness in Iran’s military capacities and raises questions about its ability to use its proxies to attack Israel in the short term.

In the past, if Israel considered attacking Iran, one of the deterrents was the likelihood of Hezbollah in Lebanon retaliating, a US official said. But now, with Hezbollah on its knees, Israel can attack Iran directly without the same threat.

(YWN Israel Desk – Jerusalem)