Hezbollah In This Hemisphere
By Dyre42 | Related entries in Bad Decisions, Immigration, The War On TerrorismCIUDAD DEL ESTE, Paraguay – The Iranian-backed Hezbollah militia has taken root in South America, fostering a well-financed force of Islamist radicals boiling with hatred for the United States and ready to die to prove it, according to militia members, U.S. officials and police agencies across the continent.From its Western base in a remote region divided by the borders of Paraguay, Brazil and Argentina known as the Tri-border, or the Triple Frontier, Hezbollah has mined the frustrations of many Muslims among about 25,000 Arab residents whose families immigrated mainly from Lebanon in two waves, after the 1948 Arab-Israeli war and after the 1985 Lebanese civil war.
An investigation by Telemundo and NBC News has uncovered details of an extensive smuggling network run by Hezbollah, a Shiite Muslim group founded in Lebanon in 1982 that the United States has labeled an international terrorist organization. The operation funnels large sums of money to militia leaders in the Middle East and finances training camps, propaganda operations and bomb attacks in South America, according to U.S. and South American officials. [...]
They are men like Mustafa Khalil Meri, a young Arab Muslim whom Telemundo interviewed in Ciudad del Este, Paraguay’s second-largest city and the center of the Tri-border region. There is nothing particularly distinctive about him, but beneath the everyday T-shirt he wears beats the heart of a devoted Hezbollah militiaman.
“If he attacks Iran, in two minutes Bush is dead,� Meri said. “We are Muslims. I am Hezbollah. We are Muslims, and we will defend our countries at any time they are attacked.�
Now you and I both know that W had to have known about this before the press did. That makes his lax stance on border security completely unforgivable. Literally we are talking about the difference between corporate profits and meaningful national security. How many experts (Lou Dobbs doesn’t count) have pointed to our southern border as being a major problem?
Think about it. If Israel feels threatened enough by Iran to take action we could be looking at acts of terrorism from within our neighbors borders. At what point in time does that become an acceptable trade off for oh say cheaper lettuce?
Here’s the real problem, one party doesn’t want to irritate it’s donors and the other doesn’t want to irritate it’s voters. Therefore the odds of any current being candidate willing to do something until after the fact are presently slim to none.
Cross posted at Dyre Portents.
This entry was posted on Thursday, May 10th, 2007 and is filed under Bad Decisions, Immigration, The War On Terrorism. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
May 10th, 2007 at 8:10 am
The Albanians just picked up were illegal, so yes it is a problem. If the attack they planned had been successful the conversation on immigration would have changed, but that did not happen and the conversation will wait until next time.
May 12th, 2007 at 7:01 pm
[...] There was a post earlier about Hezbollah’s transmigration to the Americas. (http://donklephant.com/2007/05/10/hezbollah-in-this-hemisphere-2/) I’m glad to see mention of Hezbollah in major news sources (NBC) but of course am saddened and worried by the news of Hezbollah’s spread. The news isn’t new of course, they have had operatives in South America for a while now and even carried out an attack against the Jewish Centre in Buenos Aires in 1994. Hezbollah has also been operating in the United States for some time. In 2001 the FBI broke up a Hezbollah fundraising ring as nearby as North Carolina. Former CIA Director (and newly minted author…) George Tenet once remarked that “Hezbollah, as an organization with capability and worldwide presence, is [Al-Qaeda’s] equal, if not a far more capable organization. I actually think they’re a notch above in many respects.” I’m not sure the solution to the Hezbollah threat is stonger border security though. [...]