Tony Badran strongly disagrees!
After Hezbollah took west Beirut, attacking civilians in their homes, ransacking and terrorizing neighborhoods and media outlets, following a conscious decision by Hariri not to put up a fight, the Iranian militia foolishly thought that it can just as easily overrun Jumblat on his own turf in the Shouf.
Hezbollah had another thing coming. For three days of intensive fighting in the Shouf, and contrary to the lying info ops and disinformation of Hezbollah water carriers like this clueless Hezbollah willful tool (on whose propaganda for Hezbollah I’ve written in the past and will soon be ripping to shreds once again), NOT A SINGLE VILLAGE IN THE SHOUF FELL TO HEZBOLLAH. Not Niha, like that Hezbollah watercarrier MacLeod wrote, not anything.
Quite the contrary. According to the PSP and other local sources, more than three dozen Hezbollah fighters were killed and a number of their vehicles were destroyed. The fact that they had to introduce artillery and vehicles (mounted with heavy machine guns, like so, and recoilless rifles, like so) only showed that they could not make advances into the villages.
Not just that, but Hezbollah’s attack has led Talal Arslan’s fighters to switch and fight alongside the PSP against Hezbollah, undermining Hezbollah’s tiny Druze ally — which is precisely why Jumblat put him in the forefront from the get go (it was not, as shrill commentators and dishonest flacks read it, a sign of “weakness.” It was a shrewed move by a master tactician.).