Hezbollah lost its most important supply route from Iran through Syria, the Lebanese militia’s chief Naim Qassem said, the first time he has publicly acknowledged how the fall of Bashar al-Assad’s regime has hurt the group’s ability to rearm after a punishing Israeli campaign.

The ascendance of Sunni Islamist rebels in Syria should be viewed with great caution by Western powers, but the Assad regime’s collapse disables a critical node in Iran’s regional proxy network, a counterterrorism expert explains.

The militant group’s leader admits that the toppling of Syria’s president, Bashar al-Assad, cut off an important land route from Iran.