Hezbollah is fighting in Syria, killing civilians, bombarding towns, and occupying Syrian villages. So says the Syrian opposition in a statement released on Feb. 18 amid fierce clashes that erupted a few days earlier on the Syria-Lebanon border.

According to the Syrian National Council (SNC), members of Hezbollah attacked "three Syrian villages in Kusair, near the Lebanese border, employing heavy weapons openly and under the auspices of the Syrian regime army." In the same statement, the SNC said it regards Hezbollah’s actions as a "serious threat to Syrian-Lebanese relations and regional peace and security," adding that the Beirut government has a responsibility to end this "aggression."

The SNC’s statement came as a Lebanese security source requesting anonymity revealed to Al-Monitor that three Hezbollah members had died in clashes on the northeastern border with Lebanon. The source added that 12 Syrian rebels had been killed in Kusair, which, although in Syria, has a majority Lebanese Shiite population.

Until March 2011, Hezbollah had been the most popular non-Syria organization in the war-torn nation. Posters of Hassan Nasrallah, the organization's charismatic secretary general, were everywhere. To many Syrians, he was "The Inspirer." The opposition accuses Hezbollah of having been in the muck from the first day of the Syrian revolution, helping the army crack down on demonstrators and otherwise meddling in Syrian affairs. Hezbollah has repeatedly denied allegations of military involvement, but at the same time has also made it clear that it supports the regime of President Bashar al-Assad while calling for dialogue and reforms.