Hezbollah 1985–88 War of the Camps. However, Hezbollah's early primary focus was ending Israel's occupation of southern Lebanon following Israel's 1982 invasion and siege of Beirut. Amal, the main Lebanese Shia political group, initiated guerrilla warfare. In 2006, former Israeli prime minister Ehud Barak stated, "When we entered Lebanon … there was no Hezbollah. We were accepted with perfumed rice and flowers by the Shia in the south. It was our presence there that created Hezbollah". Hezbollah waged an asymmetric war using suicide attacks against the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and Israeli targets outside of Lebanon. Hezbollah is reputed to have
Hezbollah armed strength a consequence of this setback and others like it, Hezbollah was forced to change its strategy. Outgunned by the Israelis and outspent by richer Lebanese sects and political parties, Hezbollah was forced to learn fast and reappraise its tactics, strategy, and organization. Suicide attacks gave way to "sophisticated, coordinated, and timed attacks" and short, quick ambushes. In May 1987, Hezbollah began to coordinate infantry and artillery as combined arms and "improved their capability to attack Israeli helicopters, and demonstrated improvements in extracting wounded from the battlefield." The group moved from squad-sized attacks around 1986 to platoon- and company-sized attacks by