Not surprisingly, many of the Lebanese returning to their devastated country are deluded enough to believe that Hezbollah has been victorious in their war against Israel.

The war started in Aitta Shaab, where Hizbullah fighters stole across the border and kidnapped two Israeli soldiers one month ago. When it ended at 8am yesterday morning - and not a minute earlier - the tiny town bore fearful testament to Israel’s wrath.

The town centre was utterly destroyed, reduced to a line of disembowelled buildings cloaked in ashen dust. Gigantic craters pitted the roads. Scorched vehicles slouched in the gutters.

Yet for the townspeople who slowly trickled home, many to decimated homes, the bombs had failed to obliterate one thing - a defiant sense of victory.

“I feel joy,” said Ibrahim Awada, whose grocery store had been flattened, house destroyed and three neighbours killed. “These buildings can be rebuilt. All I care is that Hizbullah defeats Israel.”

Police officer Sameeh Srur embraced Hizbullah fighters, kissing them on both cheeks. “Yes, it looks like Leningrad,” he said, referring to the Soviet city that braved the brutal German siege during the second world war. “But we brought the Israelis to their knees here. This shows that Hizbullah is the strongest army in the Middle East.”

One would suspect that since the damage to their country far exceeds that of Israel, and the loss of life on their side also far exceeds that in Israel, that they would have some understanding that they are the big losers here. But, whatever helps you sleep at night. However, it seems that the Iranians, as crazy as they are, have a much more realistic view of the situation, and understand that they have miscalculated and lost badly.

While the damage caused Israel’s military reputation tops Western assessments of the Lebanon war, DEBKAfile’s Iranian sources report an entirely different perception taking hold in ruling circles in Tehran.

After UN Security Council resolution 1701 calling for a truce was carried Friday, Aug. 11, the heads of the regime received two separate evaluations of the situation in Lebanon – one from Iran’s foreign ministry and one from its supreme national security council. Both were bleak: their compilers were concerned that Iran had been manipulatively robbed of its primary deterrent asset ahead of a probable nuclear confrontation with the United States and Israel.

While the foreign ministry report highlighted the negative aspects of the UN resolution, the council’s document complained that Hizballah squandered thousands of rockets – either by firing them into Israel or having them destroyed by the Israeli air force.

The writer of this report is furious over the waste of Iran’s most important military investment in Lebanon merely for the sake of a conflict with Israeli over two kidnapped soldiers.

It took Iran two decades to build up Hizballah’s rocket inventory.

DEBKAfile’s sources estimate that Hizballah’s adventure wiped out most of the vast sum of $4-6 bn the Iranian treasury sunk into building its military strength. The organization was meant to be strong and effective enough to provide Iran with a formidable deterrent to Israel embarking on a military operation to destroy the Islamic regime’s nuclear infrastructure.

To this end, Tehran bought the Israeli military doctrine of preferring to fight its wars on enemy soil. In the mid-1980s, Iran decided to act on this doctrine by coupling its nuclear development program with Israel’s encirclement and the weakening its deterrence strength. The Jewish state was identified at the time as the only country likely to take vigorous action to spike Iran’s nuclear aspirations.

Four to six billion dollars in  military expenditures gone in a few weeks, with nothing to show for it huh? Oh well, easy come easy go. One wonders how much more money Iran will continue to spend on Hezbollah when the most recent ceasefire dies off and the shooting starts up again. The more the better I say.

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