There are plenty of people in Lebanon who hate Hezbollah and attacks on the terror group have seen a large uptick.A Hezbollah commander who fought in Syria's civil war was shot dead outside his home in Lebanon on Wednesday in a killing which the militant Shi'ite Muslim group blamed on Israel.
Hassan al-Laqqis was shot in the head from close range by a silenced gun as he arrived home at around midnight in the Hadath district of Beirut, a source close to Hezbollah said.
Israel, which fought a 34-day war with Hezbollah in 2006, denied any role in the shooting and hinted that the motive may have been Hezbollah's military support for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in his war with Sunni Muslim rebels.
A previously unknown group, Ahrar al-Sunna Baalbek brigade, claimed responsibility for the attack in a message on Twitter. The claim could not be verified but the name of the purported group suggested Lebanese Sunni Muslim connections.
Hezbollah's blaming Israel is entirely predictable, for two reasons. One is that its entire raison d'etre is to fight Israel, and the other is that Hezbollah pretends to represent all of Lebanon and the existence of an active and significant anti-Hezbollah contingent in that country exposes Hezbollah's political vulnerability.
Today, Islamic Jihad also blamed Israel for the assassination.
Its statement read, "The assassination of Lakis comes within the framework of an open war with the enemy...This cowardly assassination is a testament to the power of resistance in the face of the Zionist entity."
While Hamas and Iran have been at odds over Syria, and Iranian funding for Hamas has been largely curtailed, this statement indicates that Islamic Jihad is quite aligned with Iran. Islamic Jihad usually doesn't comment on Lebanese affairs, so this looks like Iran instructed PIJ to make this statement.
It would not be surprising if Iran is quietly building up Islamic Jihad to eventually wage a coup in Gaza against Hamas, as Hamas has been largely responsible for the current lull of rocket fire to Israel. Right now the two groups cooperate but that is more because of Hamas' stranglehold on Gaza than anything else. Many Islamists are chafing under Hamas rule and are itching to resume attacks on Israel (and probably Egypt's army as well.)
As Hamas weakens from its budget problems, the opposition voices will become louder. Islamic Jihad will probably act like the Muslim Brotherhood did in Egypt - wait for others to start the revolution, stay on the sidelines, and then co-opt it at the eleventh hour. Outside of Hamas itself, no group in Gaza has anything close to the organizational maturity and infrastructure as Islamic Jihad.
If sanctions against Iran collapse and its oil revenues go back up, it could have a big effect on Gaza.