Argentine federal judiciary extends freeze of Hezbollah funds
"Judiciary determined that Hezbollah was the perpetrator of the attacks on the AMIA and the Israeli embassy."
By JERUSALEM POST STAFFA HEZBOLLAH supporter beams at a poster of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah during a rally on the anniversary of the Israeli withdrawal, on May 25, 2009(photo credit: JAMAL SAIDI/ REUTERS)
Argentina’s federal judiciary last week froze Hezbollah’s finances for an additional year.According to a report in La Nacion, the court “froze the funds for Hezbollah; its external security organization, Islamic Jihad; its boss, Hassan Nasrallah; Salman El Reda, who faces an arrest warrant for the AMIA attack; and the Barakat clan, the family of merchants based in the Triple Frontier who are accused of money laundering and terrorist financing.”In 1994, a joint Iranian-Hezbollah operation blew up the AMIA Jewish community center in Buenos Arias, resulting in the deaths of 85 people and wounding hundreds.“The judge who extended the Hezbollah designation should be commended because Hezbollah’s illicit finance activities continue in the country and in the tri-border area,” Toby Dershowitz, a senior vice president for government relations and strategy for the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, told The Jerusalem Post on Friday. “The key now will be to ensure aggressive enforcement so that these activities are stemmed and Hezbollah coffers that fund terrorism dry up.”“Argentina must ensure the judge’s personal protection, given the physical harm done to those who have spoken out against the dangers emanating from Hezbollah and its Iranian backers,” she said. “Harm has also come to judicial witnesses and those working in law enforcement in other cases.”La Nacion reported that “the verdict, made by federal Judge Miguel Angel Guerrero of El Dorado, Misiones, extended the freeze on the financial assets of Hezbollah and 22 more people for another year. These funds were frozen by administrative orders from the Financial Information Unit (UIF) during the administration of Mauricio Macri, then again last January by the Alberto Fernandez administration.”“Both orders were for six months and have since expired, but Judge Guerrero’s decision extends them for another year. The United States and Israeli governments were awaiting this ruling because of the political implications of financially crippling one of their greatest enemies [Hezbollah],” the report said.According to the Spanish-language paper, “The judiciary determined that Hezbollah was the perpetrator of the attacks on the AMIA and the Israeli Embassy. Some witnesses who testified in the case referred to the participation of people from the Triple Frontier, and one of them even mentioned the Barakat brothers as implicated in the preparation of the attacks.”“Judge Guerrero has been investigating the Barakat clan with the help of the Economic Criminality Prosecutor, the UIF and the Gendarmerie since 2015, when it was reported that one of its members exchanged million-dollar prizes in the casino of Puerto Iguazu and he was suspected of involvement in money laundering, especially since his name appeared on a list of suspected international terrorists. Reports determined that his family was suspected of financing Hezbollah’s terrorist activities in the Triple Frontier,” the report said.
