Iran’s network of proxy armies — stretching from Hezbollah in Lebanon to the Houthis in Yemen, Hamas in Gaza, and Shia militias in Iraq — is now in full scramble mode as the United States and Israel wage a direct military campaign against Tehran itself. Since February 28, 2026, when US and Israeli forces launched coordinated strikes on Iran’s nuclear program, missile capabilities, and IRGC infrastructure, the proxy groups that once formed a cohesive “Axis of Resistance” are fracturing, improvising, and in some cases acting on pure self-preservation instinct rather than any coordinated strategy from Tehran. The killing of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and the hasty election of his son Mojtaba Khamenei as successor on March 8 has thrown the command structure into disarray at the worst possible moment.
As of March 7, US forces had struck more than 3,000 targets inside Iran, according to CENTCOM, with over 1,200 killed in Iran and 570 in Lebanon. The IRGC’s Malek-Ashtar building in Tehran — a nerve center for military coordination — was completely destroyed by a joint US-Israel missile strike on March 2. The proxy network that Iran spent decades and billions of dollars building is now operating without reliable communication with its patron, without guaranteed resupply, and without the strategic architect who held it all together. This article breaks down where each proxy army stands right now, what the loss of the Syrian corridor means for the entire network, how the Houthis have adapted in ways that make them harder to neutralize, and what the realistic outlook is for this fractured alliance surviving in any meaningful form.
Table of Contents
- Why Are Iran’s Proxy Armies in Lebanon, Iraq, Yemen, and Gaza All Scrambling at Once?
- Hezbollah’s Depleted Arsenal and the Question of Whether It Can Still Fight
- The Houthis Have Built Something Iran’s Other Proxies Have Not
- Iraq’s Militias — 200,000 Fighters Caught Between Tehran and Baghdad
- Hamas and the Gaza Question — Degraded Beyond Recovery?
- The Syrian Corridor — Why Losing Assad Changed Everything
- What Comes After Khamenei — And Whether the Network Survives
- Conclusion
- Frequently Asked Questions
Why Are Iran’s Proxy Armies in Lebanon, Iraq, Yemen, and Gaza All Scrambling at Once?
The short answer is that iran is fighting for its own survival and can no longer play quarterback. The IRGC Quds Force, commanded by Brigadier General Esmail Qaani, historically operated on an estimated annual budget of $1–2 billion dedicated to proxy operations — funding, training, arming, and coordinating groups across multiple countries simultaneously. That coordination required functioning command infrastructure in Tehran, secure communication lines, and most critically, a stable logistics corridor through Syria. All three of those pillars have been severely damaged or destroyed within the past 18 months. The fall of the Assad regime in late 2024 was the first domino. Syria served as Iran’s vital land corridor linking Tehran to Lebanon and the Palestinian territories, the route through which Hezbollah received the bulk of its advanced weaponry.
With that route severed, each proxy was already operating with greater autonomy and diminishing resupply. Then came the direct strikes on Iran beginning February 28, 2026, which hit the IRGC’s command infrastructure itself. The result is a network where each node is making its own calculations about whether to escalate, hunker down, or negotiate — and those calculations increasingly diverge from one another. Compare this to the coordinated multi-front pressure Iran orchestrated during the 2023-2024 period, and the difference is stark. These groups are no longer executing a shared playbook. They are freelancing.
Hezbollah’s Depleted Arsenal and the Question of Whether It Can Still Fight
Hezbollah entered 2026 as a shadow of its former self. Before the current war, the organization had already suffered catastrophic losses — its entire high command was eliminated, thousands of troops were killed, and a significant portion of its arsenal was destroyed during the 2024 conflict with israel. Under a November 2024 ceasefire agreement, Hezbollah ceded 190 of its 265 military positions to the Lebanese army, a concession that would have been unthinkable just two years earlier when the group maintained an estimated 150,000-plus rockets and missiles and between 30,000 and 50,000 fighters. However, Hezbollah demonstrated on March 2, 2026, that depleted does not mean defunct. The group launched missiles and drones against northern Israel, re-entering the conflict on Iran’s side despite its weakened state.
Israel responded by striking Hezbollah targets in Beirut as part of the broader war. The critical limitation here is resupply. With the Syrian corridor gone and Iran under direct bombardment, Hezbollah is burning through whatever stockpiles it has left with no clear path to replenishment. If the war extends beyond weeks, Hezbollah faces the prospect of being militarily irrelevant — capable of symbolic strikes but unable to sustain any kind of campaign. The 570 casualties reported in Lebanon as of early March suggest the human cost is already significant, and Lebanese public tolerance for another devastating war is not what it was a decade ago.
The Houthis Have Built Something Iran’s Other Proxies Have Not
Yemen’s Houthis present a fundamentally different problem than Hezbollah or Hamas, and understanding why requires looking at what they built while everyone else was losing ground. Despite sustained US, UK, and Israeli strikes from 2023 through 2025, the Houthis retained power over the majority of Yemen and — critically — developed domestic arms manufacturing capability that reduces their dependence on Iranian supply lines. This is the single most important distinction in the entire proxy network. While Hezbollah cannot function without resupply and Hamas has been operationally decimated, the Houthis have a degree of self-sufficiency that makes the severing of Iranian logistics less catastrophic for them.
Following the US-Israel strikes on Iran, the Houthis announced they would resume attacks on Red Sea shipping and US military installations. This was particularly notable because they had previously signed a deal with trump in May 2025 agreeing to stop attacking US ships — a deal that is now effectively dead. The Houthis have geographic advantages that other proxies lack: they control difficult mountainous terrain, they are far from Israel’s direct reach, and years of Saudi-led coalition warfare failed to dislodge them. The practical reality is that even if Iran’s proxy coordination collapses entirely, the Houthis will continue to exist as an autonomous armed force capable of disrupting one of the world’s most important shipping lanes.
Iraq’s Militias — 200,000 Fighters Caught Between Tehran and Baghdad
Iraq represents perhaps the most volatile piece of this puzzle because the proxy forces there are enormous and deeply embedded in the state itself. Pro-Iranian Iraqi militias number an estimated 200,000 fighters, operate with billions in budget, and maintain significant de facto autonomy from the Iraqi government. When the US-Israel strikes on Iran began, a pro-Iranian Iraqi militia claimed responsibility for drone attacks on US troops at Baghdad airport and a US base in Erbil — acts that put Iraq’s government in an impossible position. The tradeoff facing Iraqi leaders is ugly. The US and its allies are pushing for Iran-backed groups to either disarm or be absorbed into Iraqi state armed forces, a demand that has been on the table for years but now carries new urgency.
From Baghdad’s perspective, absorbing these militias means giving tens of thousands of battle-hardened, ideologically motivated fighters official state sanction and salaries — essentially rewarding them for years of operating outside the chain of command. But failing to absorb them means Iraq remains a battlefield where Iranian proxies can drag the country into a war that the Iraqi government did not choose. Neither option is good. The difference between Iraq and Lebanon or Yemen is that Iraq’s militias are large enough and institutionally entrenched enough that they cannot simply be bombed into irrelevance. They require a political solution, and political solutions in Iraq move at a glacial pace.
Hamas and the Gaza Question — Degraded Beyond Recovery?
Hamas presents the starkest example of what sustained military pressure can do to a proxy force that lacks self-sufficiency. Since the October 7, 2023 attacks and the subsequent Israeli military operations, Hamas has been severely degraded. Key leaders have been killed. Organizational structures have been decimated. Unlike the Houthis, Hamas had no domestic manufacturing base capable of sustaining operations under this kind of pressure, and unlike Hezbollah, it had no state-within-a-state infrastructure to fall back on.
The warning for anyone analyzing this situation is against assuming that military degradation equals political elimination. Hamas as an armed force capable of the kind of operation it executed on October 7 may be finished. But Hamas as a political movement, as an idea, as a recruitment brand among Palestinians who have endured over two years of devastating warfare in Gaza — that is a different question entirely. Iran’s inability to resupply or coordinate with Hamas does not solve the underlying political conditions that created Hamas in the first place. This is a limitation that pure military analysis consistently fails to account for, and it is the reason that declarations of victory over non-state actors have historically aged poorly.
The Syrian Corridor — Why Losing Assad Changed Everything
The fall of the Assad regime in late 2024 deserves special emphasis because it was arguably a more consequential blow to Iran’s proxy network than anything that has happened since. Syria was not just an ally — it was the infrastructure. The land corridor from Iran through Iraq and Syria into Lebanon was the route by which Hezbollah received advanced missiles, guidance systems, and the materiel that made it a strategic threat to Israel rather than merely a nuisance militia. With Assad gone, that corridor is severed.
Iran can no longer truck weapons overland to Hezbollah. Air resupply would require flying over hostile or uncooperative airspace, and sea routes are limited and monitored. This single development transformed Hezbollah from a force that could theoretically sustain a prolonged conflict into one that is spending down a finite and diminishing stockpile. Every rocket Hezbollah fires at Israel now is one it likely cannot replace.
What Comes After Khamenei — And Whether the Network Survives
The election of Mojtaba Khamenei as Supreme Leader on March 8, 2026, just days after his father’s death, signals continuity in name but raises serious questions about capacity. The elder Khamenei spent decades building personal relationships with proxy leaders, establishing trust, and serving as the ultimate arbiter of the network’s strategic direction. His son inherits the title but not the relationships, and he assumes power at a moment when Iran’s military infrastructure is under active bombardment and the country has already sustained over 1,200 casualties. The forward-looking reality is this: Iran’s proxy network was built for a world in which Iran itself was untouchable — where deterrence kept the US and Israel from striking Tehran directly, leaving Iran free to project power through intermediaries. That world ended on February 28, 2026.
Even if the current war ends tomorrow, the demonstration that the US and Israel will strike Iran directly changes the strategic calculus permanently. Proxies exist to provide deniability and strategic depth. When the patron state is being hit with 3,000-plus strikes anyway, the entire rationale for the proxy model comes into question. Some of these groups — particularly the Houthis and Iraqi militias — will survive because they have independent bases of power. Others, like Hezbollah and Hamas, face existential questions about what they are without Iranian backing.
Conclusion
Iran’s proxy network is not dead, but it is fundamentally broken as a coordinated strategic enterprise. The combination of losing the Syrian corridor, the direct US-Israel military campaign against Iran, the death of Khamenei, and the individual degradation of groups like Hezbollah and Hamas has turned what was once a unified “Axis of Resistance” into a collection of independent actors making survival calculations. The Houthis will likely endure because of their self-sufficiency and geographic isolation. Iraqi militias will persist because of their sheer size and political entrenchment. But the idea of a synchronized, multi-front pressure campaign directed from Tehran — the nightmare scenario that drove Israeli and American strategic planning for two decades — is, for now, off the table.
What replaces it remains deeply uncertain. Trump’s stated war objectives — destroying Iran’s missile capabilities, annihilating its navy, ending its nuclear ambitions, and stopping it from arming proxy groups — are ambitious in the extreme. History suggests that military campaigns can degrade capabilities but rarely eliminate movements. The 12 casualties reported in Israel compared to the 1,200 in Iran and 570 in Lebanon illustrate the asymmetry of the current conflict, but asymmetry in casualties has never been a reliable predictor of political outcomes in this region. The scramble is real. Whether it leads to lasting strategic change or simply a period of regrouping depends on factors that bombs alone cannot determine.
Frequently Asked Questions
Are all of Iran’s proxy groups fighting in the current war?
Not all are equally engaged. Hezbollah has re-entered the fight by launching missiles and drones at Israel. The Houthis have announced a resumption of attacks on Red Sea shipping and US installations. Iraqi militias have conducted drone attacks on US forces. Hamas, however, is too degraded to mount significant operations.
Can Iran still resupply its proxies during the war?
Resupply is severely constrained. The fall of Assad’s Syria eliminated the critical land corridor to Lebanon. Iran’s own military infrastructure is under bombardment with over 3,000 targets struck by the US. The Houthis are the least affected because they have developed domestic arms manufacturing capability.
Who is leading Iran after Khamenei’s death?
Mojtaba Khamenei, the son of the late Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, was elected as his successor on March 8, 2026. He inherits a country under active military assault and a proxy network in disarray.
Did the Houthis break their deal with Trump?
The Houthis signed a deal with Trump in May 2025 agreeing to stop attacking US ships. Following the US-Israel strikes on Iran beginning February 28, 2026, they announced they would resume attacks, effectively putting that agreement in jeopardy.
How many fighters do Iran’s proxy groups have combined?
Iraqi militias alone are estimated at approximately 200,000 fighters. Hezbollah’s pre-war strength was estimated at 30,000 to 50,000 fighters, though that number has been significantly reduced. Combined with Houthi forces and remnants of other groups, the total network likely exceeded 300,000 before the current conflicts, though current operational strength is substantially lower.
What were Trump’s stated objectives for the war with Iran?
Trump stated the war objectives as destroying Iran’s missile capabilities, annihilating its navy, ending its nuclear ambitions, and stopping Iran from arming proxy groups across the region.