"The EU will be more open towards a Hezbollah-led government,"

Deutsche Well, here

"... While the US puts Hezbollah in the same category as the Hamas movement ruling the Gaza Strip, the EU has not taken this step of alienation. In 2006, the EU decided not to initiate ties to Hamas, despite its clear parliamentary majority in elections.

"The Europeans decided not to talk to the elected representative and this didn't help to further our interests in Palestine because we didn't have a contact into the Gaza Strip anymore," Perthes said. "We even opened the doors widely for Iran to cooperate with the elected Hamas government."

According to Christopher Radler, a research fellow from the Duesseldorf Institute for Foreign and Security Policy, this experience of international isolation will not repeat itself.

"The EU will be more open towards a Hezbollah-led government," Radler said.

Western nations did not even have the option of treating Hezbollah as they treated Hamas, said Luce Ricard from the European Institute for Research on Mediterranean and Euro-Arab Cooperation (Medea).

"It would be damaging because the West cannot boycott a Lebanese government as easily as it has boycotted the Syrian regime or the leaders of Hamas in Palestine since Lebanon embodies too many economic, political and cultural interests and ties to the West," Ricard said in a Medea paper published last month....

Radler said that over the years, Hezbollah had also undergone a change from "a regional division of Iran's Islamic revolution" to a "representative of Lebanese nationalism."

In addition, Hezbollah was not a terrorist group detached from society, but rather a mass movement supported by millions of Lebanese, he said.

Ricard also said Hezbollah could not be placed in the same category as Hamas.

"The movement is highly structured and witnesses a varied and solid support since the Israeli attack of summer 2006," Ricard said. "Its ability to present itself as the defender of the Arabs – and not only the Shiites - against Israel and its impressive communication strategy made the party a recognized player in the whole Arab scene."