Without the security zone, Israel had no buffer between its civilian population and Hizbullah.
Since last August's cease-fire, under Iranian direction Hizbullah has operated on three levels at once.
Yemen's president, Ali Abdullah Saleh, says members of Lebanon's Iran-backed Hizbullah militia are teaching them.
And Lebanese Christian voters did not reject Hizbullah because Obama is president of the United States.
Turkish Hizbullah is not believed to be associated with the Lebanese guerrilla group of the same name.
Perhaps a dozen other Lebanese held by Israel, but not related to Hizbullah, may also be released.
They do not seek nuclear weapons and they do not support the likes of Hamas and Hizbullah.
It was also her position on how the country should secure its interests regarding Lebanon and Hizbullah.
Hizbullah claims the loyalty of most of Lebanon's Shias, who make up around a third of the population.
Other recent reports relayed French concern that their embassy in Beirut is being targeted for attack by Hizbullah.
But even Hizbullah, some of whose officials say they would like to follow Mr Sistani's advice, shows signs of reconsidering.
Recognizing the trap, Hariri's supporters are calling for him to form a narrow coalition without Hizbullah and its sister parties.
Iranians remain uncomfortably aware that the Ansar-e-Hizbullah, a semi-official vigilante group, has in the past been accused of murdering reformists.
After last month's Lebanese elections in which Hizbullah lost to Sa'ad Hariri's March 14 movement, the administration went a step further.
Unlike Barak and his protean chorus in the Israeli media, SLA forces understood that an Israeli withdrawal meant a Hizbullah victory.
Lebanon's loss of independence is especially bad news for Hizbullah, a conservative Islamic party that willingly shares power in Lebanon's parliament.
And earlier this month, the police announced the arrest last month of another Israeli Arab on charges of spying for Hizbullah.
Then too, this week Lebanon's An Nahar newspaper reported that Hizbullah was moving to extend its independent telephone network to the south.
Wednesday's briefing, in which the IDF made clear that it knows where Hizbullah has hidden its missiles, was aimed at deterring war.
Mahmoud Komati, one of Mr Nasrallah's deputies, seemed to confirm that by saying this week that Hizbullah did not expect Israel's massive response.
As The Jerusalem Post's Barry Rubin argued on his Web site, The Rubin Report, Brennan's assessment of Hizbullah is not merely factually wrong.
Sarkozy legitimized all three when he invited Hizbullah representatives to participate in talks he held with Lebanese factions outside of Paris this month.
With Lebanon's economy poised precariously on the brink of ruin, Hizbullah may not wish to alienate its countrymen by risking massive Israeli retaliation.
And even when it comes into being the Lebanese government is not going to be eager to impose its will on Hizbullah by force.
America, Syria and Iran are also on opposite sides in the conflicts between Israel and Hamas and between Hizbullah and the government of Lebanon.
Even Sheikh Muhammad Hussein Fadlallah, the late spiritual leader of Lebanon's Hizbullah party-cum-militia, conceded that more research is needed in order to understand homosexuality.
The secretive Turkish Hizbullah group seeking to set up a state based on strict Sharia Islamic law grew up in the late 1980s in southeast Turkey.
The attack came on the anniversary of the bombing, also blamed on Hizbullah, of a Jewish community centre in Argentina in 1994, which killed 85 people.
Former MK and Balad leader Azmi Bishara fled the country in 2007 to avoid being arrested for serving as a Hizbullah spy in the 2006 war.
Egypt's recent actions against Hizbullah operatives are a watershed event for understanding the nature of the threat that Iran constitutes for both regional and global security.
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