Hezbollah’s multipurpose drug trade
Law enforcement agencies around the world have uncovered the extensive drug trafficking operations of Hezbollah and its affiliated groups and individuals. The main objective of its involvement in the narcotics trade is financial, to fund its expanding activities in Syria, Iraq, Yemen and Lebanon itself. However, more recently, there appears to be another motive: To undercut the social cohesion of its adversaries. That also means Iran’s adversaries, as the group is practically the operational regional arm of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and its Quds Force in particular.
The US Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) has been at the
forefront of these efforts because of the long history of Hezbollah attacks
against American interests. The DEA has the largest US law enforcement presence
overseas. In 2008, it launched Project Cassandra in an effort to undercut the
group’s funding from illicit drug sources. Other US government agencies and
those of its allies and partners are also focused on Hezbollah, which has become
an important albeit destructive force regionally and beyond, working largely as
a proxy for Iran. According to the DEA, Hezbollah has become increasingly
involved in drug trafficking and organized crime to fund its activities, with
large sums of drug money being laundered from the Americas, Africa and Europe
into Lebanon and then Hezbollah's coffers.
The DEA has also established the Counter-Narcoterrorism
Operations Center, which focuses on the links between narcotics and terrorism.
Because of that focus, it was instrumental in foiling the 2011 Iranian plot to
assassinate Adel Al-Jubeir, Saudi Arabia’s then-ambassador to the US, in
Washington. The plot was derailed when one of the suspects, Mansour Arbabsiar,
attempted to hire a Mexican organized crime gang member, who was in fact a DEA
informant.
Hezbollah has been an important target for law enforcement
agencies because it acts as a semi-state actor, has enormous resources and is
very effective as a multipurpose terrorist organization and sectarian militia.
In Lebanon, it effectively controls large swaths of territory in the south,
Beirut and the Bekaa Valley. It has significant political influence in the
Lebanese government as well as in parliament, where it exercises an effective
veto power through alliances with other political groups.
To fund the huge expansion of its operations outside Lebanon
during the past decade, it has developed a large financial network. In addition
to direct funding from the Iranian government, which Hezbollah openly acknowledges,
it gets funding from levies it imposes on legitimate businesses or appropriates
from the government operations it controls, such as ports and
telecommunications. However, much of its funding comes from drug trafficking.
For these reasons and the fact that it has become a lethal
fighting force for Iran’s regional adventurism, countering Hezbollah’s
activities has become a high national security priority for many countries.
What has been uncovered about the group’s activities may
just be the tip of the iceberg. In the US, Operation Titan intercepted the sale
of multi-ton cocaine shipments by Hezbollah associates in cooperation with a
Colombian drug cartel. And cases in the US since then have identified
additional Lebanese and Colombian individuals, as well as the Lebanese Canadian
Bank. In 2016, Operation Cedar targeted an international money-laundering
scheme, leading to the arrests of Hezbollah operatives and collaborators in
Belgium, France, Germany and Italy.
Other investigations have led to the identification, arrest
or extradition of numerous individuals and outfits involved in Hezbollah’s
funding schemes across six continents, but mainly in Europe, West Africa and
Latin America.
To protect its illicit global funding network and cover its
tracks, Hezbollah has resorted to kidnapping and assassinating witnesses and
intimidating government officials involved in the investigations into its
activities. For example, in 2014, it kidnapped five Czech military officers
based in Lebanon. They were only released after a Hezbollah operative was freed
from Czech custody. In 2017, another Hezbollah operative was extradited from
Belgium to the US after plans to assassinate the prosecutors involved in his
case and kidnap a Belgian defense attache in Beirut were foiled.
Hezbollah uses its illicit funds to finance its own
operations and those of its partners and allies. It is believed that Hezbollah
has, for example, used such proceeds to buy arms for fighters recruited by Iran
to fight in Syria and for the Houthis in Yemen.
While funding is the main purpose of Hezbollah’s drug trafficking,
it also has another, more nefarious purpose: To weaken its enemies by trying to
encourage drug addiction among their fighting-age populations. Reports from
Syria by Al-Arabiya, Al-Hurra, Asharq Al-Awsat and others have documented how
Hezbollah and its affiliated groups have worked to demoralize communities in
Syria and Lebanon by turning local economies into drug manufacturing areas and
facilitating youth drug use.
The law enforcement and customs agencies of Lebanon’s
neighbors have frequently intercepted large quantities of drugs made in Lebanon
or Syria. It is probably not an accident that those drug smuggling operations
target Hezbollah and Iran’s adversaries. Saudi Arabia has been one of the main
targets. In April, Saudi Ambassador to Lebanon Walid Al-Bukhari tweeted that
more than 50 million Captagon pills had been intercepted since the beginning of
2020 at Jeddah’s main seaport, hidden in fruit and vegetable shipments.
Al-Bukhari further told Al-Arabiya TV in April that about 600 million pills had
been intercepted during the previous six years: “Enough to drown the whole Arab
world in drugs.” As a result, Saudi Arabia has suspended the import of fruits
and vegetables from Lebanon.
While fragile communities in war-torn areas have been
decimated by Hezbollah’s drugs, Gulf countries are more difficult targets.
Precautionary measures such as the ban on imports from Lebanon should move the
Lebanese authorities to crack down on this growing trade in drugs, and they
should join law enforcement agencies around the world to fight it. Otherwise,
economic ruin would be the wages of negligence, not to mention a serious
addiction problem.
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