European Union’s decision on Monday, July 22nd to ban
Hezbollah’s military wing proved no more than Europe’s readiness to the move
forward with the war on terrorism and cooperation with the U.S.
Though the Israeli government is inclined to take credit for the
above decision, the main provider of pressure on Union members was the Obama
administration and as such, it deserves most of the credit for this development.
Over the past few years, the administration has increased its efforts to
convince the EU to sanction Hezbollah. The result of this massive pressure has
been the banning of merely the military wing, and not the organization itself. As
John Brennan, President Obama’s Chief Homeland Security and Counter-Terrorism
Advisor, called on October 26, 2012, for the EU to recognize that Hezbollah
continues to pose a real and growing terrorist threat to Europe, the United
States, and the world.
The EU has now taken a huge step by formally asserting that
Hezbollah is involved with terrorist activity and this has several
implications. Sanctions will be enacted that will include travel
restrictions for Hezbollah’s military officials and the freezing of
European-held assets of the military wing. Both of these constraints mean that
Hezbollah will no longer be able to conduct fundraising for its military
activities within the EU, nor will it be able to transfer monies through
European banks to Lebanon for the same purposes. However, the organization has
not held open European fundraising events to benefit its military wing in
Europe for years. Hezbollah’s main base of activity used to be in the UK, but
after that country banned the military wing several years ago, it had to adapt
and adjust its policies accordingly.
Hezbollah is a hybrid organization, meaning that though it has many
coordinated and cooperative branches, in the end, it is a unified organization.
Though the EU differentiates Hezbollah’s military wing from its political and
social wings – the organization is still one entity. And that is what makes the
EU’s decision an empty shell.
Let’s take Hassan Nasrallah as the first example. Nasrallah is a
political figure in European eyes. He is not a military man and not subject to
banning, in the EU list. However, since Imad Mughniyah was assassinated in 2008,
the leader of the military wing remains unknown, and therefore cannot be
designated, nor can be identified by official authorities.
As for collecting funds, Hezbollah’s current European fundraising is
focused almost entirely on collecting funds from local Shia communities through
donations to Lebanese social organizations, such as al-Shahid Foundation,
or Jihad al-Bina. This Zakat (charity) money is sent to Lebanon
and Hezbollah’s use of those funds is not supervised so it is impossible to
know whether they are building schools or buying more guns for its fighters.
Moreover, Hezbollah’s assets are probably not listed under its military wing’s
name, but rather in the name of the political or social wings. As such, the
financial damage to the organization would be pretty minor.
Was the EU’s decision worth all the efforts that the US, Britain,
and Israel have made over recent years? Make no mistake – it is a big step for the EU, but it makes no
sense to designate only one part of the organization. You either decide to ban
the organization as a whole, or not at all. A hybrid Hezbollah is a complicated
creature, and the EU should have known better.
For further reading:
No comments:
Post a Comment