The Axis of Resistance

How Iran built a regional network — and why it matters now

Series: Iran · Part 2 of the Iran series — see also: Compliance Is for the Naive

The phrase "Axis of Resistance" gets thrown around constantly in coverage of the current conflict, usually without much explanation of what it is. It's treated as a monolith — Iran and its proxies — when in reality it's five distinct movements, in five different countries, with different histories, different grievances, and very different relationships with Tehran. Some are creatures of Iran. Some predate the relationship entirely. Understanding which is which changes how the whole conflict reads.

This is the overview — a map of the full picture. Subsequent pieces will go deeper into each component: how it started, how Iran got involved, what it looks like today, and what the current war means for its future.

Iran Series

1. Compliance Is for the Naive — Why Iran's hardliners see nuclear weapons as the only guarantee of survival
2. The Axis of Resistance — How Iran built a regional network, and why it matters now (this piece)
3. Palestine, Gaza & Hezbollah — The longest threads (coming soon)
4. The Houthis (Ansar Allah) — Yemen's war within a war (coming soon)
5. Iraq's Shia Militias — The PMF and the state within a state (coming soon)
6. Syria — The linchpin that broke (coming soon)

What Is the Axis of Resistance?

The term itself is Iran's. It describes a network of state and non-state actors aligned — to varying degrees — against Israel, the United States, and the broader Western-allied order in the Middle East. Tehran frames it as a unified front of resistance against imperialism and Zionism. Critics call it a collection of proxies Iran uses to project power without risking direct confrontation.

The truth is somewhere between those two framings, and it varies by member.

The connective tissue is the IRGC Quds Force — the external operations arm of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. For over two decades, this organization was personified by one man: Qasem Soleimani, who built, funded, trained, and coordinated the network until his assassination by a US drone strike at Baghdad International Airport on January 3, 2020. His death was meant to decapitate the network. Instead, it may have accelerated its evolution from a centrally managed system into something more distributed and harder to disrupt.

The Map

Five components, moving roughly from west to east:

Hezbollah — Lebanon (1982)

Created by Iran. The original and most integrated member. The IRGC helped establish it during the Lebanese Civil War, funds it (estimated $700M/year according to U.S. State Department and CSIS assessments, pre-2024 war), trains it, and arms it. Hezbollah's leadership has historically taken strategic direction from Tehran.

Hamas / PIJ — Gaza / West Bank (1987 / ~1981)

Adopted, not created. Hamas is Sunni, rooted in the Palestinian branch of the Muslim Brotherhood — ideologically distant from Shia Iran. The relationship is strategic, not organic: Iran provides funding and weapons, but Hamas maintains independent decision-making. Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) is smaller and more tightly aligned with Tehran.

Ansar Allah (Houthis) — Yemen (~2004)

Opportunistic alignment. The Houthis are Zaydi Shia with deep local roots in a Yemeni civil war that long predates Iranian involvement. Iran saw an opportunity and increased support — weapons, training, intelligence — but the Houthis are not an Iranian creation and have their own agenda. Their targeting of Red Sea shipping has made them the most globally disruptive member of the network.

Iraqi Shia Militias — Iraq (2003–2014)

Deep integration. Groups like Kata'ib Hezbollah, Asa'ib Ahl al-Haq, and others within the Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF) were built with direct IRGC support during and after the US occupation. Many are now formally embedded in the Iraqi state while still taking direction from Tehran. The most complex dual-loyalty arrangement in the network.

Syria (Assad era) — 1979 alliance

State alliance, now collapsed. The Assad regime was Iran's only state-level ally — critical as a land bridge for weapons transfers to Hezbollah via the Bekaa Valley. Iran and Russia spent enormous resources keeping Assad in power during the civil war. His fall in late 2024 effectively severed this corridor and fundamentally weakened the network's geographic coherence.

The Logic: Why Iran Built This

Iran's strategic position after the 1979 revolution was precarious. A new theocratic state, surrounded by hostile Sunni Arab neighbors, at war with Iraq (backed by the US, Soviet Union, and Gulf states simultaneously), and cut off from the Western alliances that had sustained the Shah. The regime needed a way to project power beyond its borders without the conventional military strength to do it.

The answer was asymmetric influence — build relationships with non-state actors who share an enemy, arm them, train them, and create a network that can threaten adversaries on multiple fronts simultaneously without Iran having to fight directly.

From Tehran's perspective, the logic is defensive. Iran has no formal military allies (no NATO equivalent), limited conventional power projection, and a long history of being invaded, sanctioned, and threatened with regime change. The Axis of Resistance is its deterrence architecture — the ability to say: attack Iran and face retaliation from Lebanon, Gaza, Iraq, and Yemen simultaneously.

From the perspective of Israel, the Gulf states, and the United States, the logic is aggressive. Iran is destabilizing sovereign nations, arming designated terrorist organizations, and building an offensive capability aimed at Israel's destruction.

Both framings contain truth. The network is simultaneously a defensive deterrent for Iran and an offensive threat to its neighbors. That duality is what makes the problem so intractable.

The Soleimani Era (1998–2020)

No single figure shaped the Axis of Resistance more than Qasem Soleimani, who commanded the IRGC Quds Force for over twenty years. He was part diplomat, part general, part intelligence chief — the man who coordinated between Hezbollah's Nasrallah, Iraqi militia leaders, Houthi commanders, and Assad's generals.

Under Soleimani, the network became remarkably effective:

• Hezbollah fought Israel to a standstill in the 2006 Lebanon War — a result that reshaped assumptions about what a non-state force could achieve against a modern military
• Iraqi militias made the US occupation increasingly costly, contributing to the eventual withdrawal
• Iran and Hezbollah kept Assad in power when his regime appeared months from collapse in 2013–2015
• The Houthis, with Iranian support, survived a Saudi-led coalition bombing campaign and naval blockade for years

Soleimani's assassination by a US drone strike on January 3, 2020 was intended to break this coordination. His successor, Esmail Qaani, is widely considered less charismatic and less operationally capable. But the network had matured enough to continue functioning — the relationships and supply chains Soleimani built had become institutional, not personal.

What Changed: October 7 and Its Aftermath

Hamas's attack on Israel on October 7, 2023 set off a chain reaction across the entire network — though the degree of Iranian coordination remains debated. US and Israeli intelligence assessments suggest Iran was aware of Hamas's general intent but not the specific timing or scale.

What followed reshaped the axis fundamentally:

• Gaza — Israel's military response devastated Hamas's military infrastructure and much of Gaza itself. The humanitarian catastrophe became a global flashpoint.
• Hezbollah — opened a "support front" against Israel from southern Lebanon, escalating through 2024 into a full Israeli ground incursion. Israeli intelligence operations — including the September 2024 pager and radio attacks — decimated Hezbollah's senior leadership, including longtime leader Hassan Nasrallah. A ceasefire took hold in late 2024 but remains fragile.
• Houthis — began attacking commercial shipping in the Red Sea in November 2023, disrupting one of the world's most critical trade routes and forcing a US-led naval response (Operation Prosperity Guardian). As of March 2026, these attacks continue.
• Iraqi militias — launched drone and rocket attacks on US bases in Iraq and Syria, prompting US retaliatory strikes. The Iraqi government has been caught between its security relationship with Washington and the militias' formal integration into state forces.
• Syria — Assad fell in December 2024 when opposition forces advanced rapidly and neither Russia nor Iran intervened to save him. The land bridge to Hezbollah was severed.

By early 2026, the Axis of Resistance had suffered its most significant setbacks since its creation: Nasrallah dead, Hamas's military capacity degraded, Assad gone, the Syrian corridor cut. And yet Iran itself remained untouched — until the current war began.

The Current State: March 2026

The US-Iran war that began in late February 2026 has reframed the entire network. For the first time, Iran is the direct target rather than the coordinator behind proxy lines. This creates a paradox: the proxies were designed to prevent exactly this scenario, and they failed to deter it.

Hezbollah — Leadership decimated, ceasefire nominally holding in Lebanon, but the organization retains significant rocket inventory and could re-enter the fight. Its calculus is complicated — another war with Israel while Lebanon's economy is in freefall risks the organization's survival as a political force.

Hamas / PIJ — Military capacity severely degraded after 17 months of war in Gaza. Political leadership dispersed. Retains some operational capability but is no longer the force it was on October 6, 2023.

Houthis — The most active member of the network. Continuing Red Sea shipping attacks and claiming strikes on Israel. Have proven remarkably resilient against US and allied military pressure.

Iraqi Militias — Conducting attacks on US forces in Iraq and Syria. The Iraqi government is caught between its relationship with Washington and the militias' integration into state security forces.

Syria — Effectively removed from the network. The new government is navigating between all sides. Iran's land corridor to Lebanon is gone.

The Questions This Series Will Explore

Each deep dive will answer:

• Origins — How did this group form? What local grievances or conflicts gave it life, independent of Iran?
• The Iran connection — When and how did Iran get involved? Was the group created by Iran, adopted, or aligned opportunistically?
• How it works — Funding, weapons, training, command relationships. How much autonomy does each group actually have?
• Current state — What does the group look like after October 7, after the Israeli operations of 2024, and now during the US-Iran war?
• What comes next — Can the network survive the current war? What does it look like on the other side?

The next essay in this series will focus on Palestine, Gaza, and Hezbollah — the two longest threads in the network, both rooted in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and both dramatically reshaped by the past eighteen months.

Sources & References

Hezbollah

• Founded with IRGC assistance during the 1982 Israeli invasion of Lebanon; publicly announced via the 1985 Open Letter
• $700M/year funding estimate — U.S. State Department; Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) assessments; Matthew Levitt, Hezbollah: The Global Footprint of Lebanon's Party of God (2013). Figures are pre-2024 war estimates.

Hamas & Palestinian Islamic Jihad

• Hamas founded December 1987 during the First Intifada, rooted in the Palestinian Muslim Brotherhood (established in Gaza in the 1940s)
• PIJ founded approximately 1981 by Fathi Shaqaqi and Abd al-Aziz Awda in Egypt
• Iran-Hamas relationship: Council on Foreign Relations backgrounder; International Crisis Group reporting

Houthis / Ansar Allah

• Zaydi Shia identity and origins in the Sa'dah wars — International Crisis Group, "Yemen's al-Qaeda: Expanding the Base" and subsequent Yemen reporting
• Red Sea attacks began November 2023; Operation Prosperity Guardian announced December 2023
• Iranian support level debated — UN Panel of Experts on Yemen reports document weapons transfers

Iraqi Shia Militias

• Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF/Hashd al-Shaabi) formally established June 2014 via fatwa from Grand Ayatollah Sistani, but many component groups date to the 2003-2011 US occupation
• IRGC role in establishing Kata'ib Hezbollah, Asa'ib Ahl al-Haq — Phillip Smyth, Washington Institute for Near East Policy

Syria

• Iran-Syria alliance dating to 1979 — one of few countries to support Iran during the Iran-Iraq War
• Assad fall December 2024 — real-time reporting from multiple outlets
• Land bridge (Iran → Iraq → Syria → Bekaa Valley, Lebanon) documented in IISS and CSIS analyses

Soleimani & Quds Force

• Commanded Quds Force from approximately 1998 until assassination January 3, 2020
• Killed by US MQ-9 Reaper strike near Baghdad International Airport
• Successor Esmail Qaani appointed January 2020

October 7 and Iranian Knowledge

• Degree of Iranian foreknowledge debated; Wall Street Journal, Reuters, and AP reporting cite conflicting intelligence assessments. General awareness without operational specifics is the emerging consensus among Western analysts.

Pager Attacks

• September 17-18, 2024 attacks on Hezbollah communication devices — widely reported; attributed to Israeli intelligence

AI is used as a research and synthesis tool for this publication. The questions, framing, and editorial judgment are the author's. For more on how Parallax works, see the About page.