Islamic Jihad

Also Known As:

Hizballah -Hezbollah (Party of God)

Palestine Islamic Jihad

Revolutionary Justice Organization

Organization of the Oppressed on Earth

Formed in 1982 in response to the Israeli invasion of Lebanon, this Lebanon-based radical Shia group takes its ideological inspiration from the Iranian revolution and the teachings of the late Ayatollah Khomeini. The Majlis al-Shura, or Consultative Council, is the group’s highest governing body and is led by Secretary General Hasan Nasrallah. Hizballah is dedicated to liberating Jerusalem and eliminating Israel, and has formally advocated ultimate establishment of Islamic rule in Lebanon. Nonetheless, Hizballah has actively participated in Lebanon’s political system since 1992.

Strongly anti-Western and anti-Israeli. Closely allied with, and often directed by Iran, but may have conducted operations that were not approved by Tehran.

The group is based in the Syrian capital, Damascus, and receives substantial amounts of financial, training, weapons, explosives, political, diplomatic, and organizational aid from Iran and Syria. It also opposes pro-Western Arab governments.

Six countries, Australia, Israel, Canada, The Netherlands, The United States and the United Kingdom, officially list Hezbollah, or its external security arm, as a terrorist organization,

Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah

Secretary General of Hezbollah

Activities:

Known or suspected to have been involved in numerous anti-US and anti-Israeli terrorist attacks, including the suicide truck bombings of the US Embassy and US Marine barracks in Beirut in 1983 and the US Embassy annex in Beirut in 1984. Three members of Hizballah, ‘Imad Mughniyah, Hasan Izz-al-Din, and Ali Atwa, are on the FBI’s list of 22 Most Wanted Terrorists for the 1985 hijacking of TWA Flight 847 during which a US Navy diver was murdered. Elements of the group were responsible for the kidnapping and detention of Americans and other Westerners in Lebanon in the 1980s. Hizballah also attacked the Israeli Embassy in Argentina in 1992 and the Israeli cultural center in Buenos Aires in 1994. In 2000, Hizballah operatives captured three Israeli soldiers in the Shab’a Farms and kidnapped an Israeli noncombatant.

Hizballah also provides guidance and financial and operational support for Palestinian extremist groups engaged in terrorist operations in Israel and the occupied territories.

In 2004, Hizballah launched an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) that left Lebanese airspace and flew over the Israeli town of Nahariya before crashing into Lebanese territorial waters. Ten days prior to the event, the Hizballah Secretary General said Hizballah would come up with new measures to counter Israeli Air Force violations of Lebanese airspace. Hizballah also continued launching small scale attacks across the Israeli border, resulting in the deaths of several Israeli soldiers. In March 2004, Hizballah and HAMAS signed an agreement to increase joint efforts to perpetrate attacks against Israel. In late 2004, Hizballah’s al-Manar television station, based in Beirut with an estimated ten million viewers worldwide, was prohibited from broadcasting in France. Al-Manar was placed on the Terrorist Exclusion List (TEL) in the United States, which led to its removal from the program offerings of its main cable service provider, and made it more difficult for al-Manar associates and affiliates to operate in the United States.

On February 12, 2008, Imad Mughnieh ,a senior member of the Hezbollah organization, was killed by a car bomb in Damascus, Syria. He was suspected of planning kidnappings, hijacking, and attacks in Beirut during the 1980s and '90s. He was wanted by Interpol and the United States Government.

Interpol wanted him in connection with his alleged participation in an attack on an Argentine Israeli association in which 85 people were killed and almost 300 wounded.

The United States believe he was responsible for the abduction of William Buckley, the head of its Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) office in Lebanon, who was later found dead.

Washington also blamed him for masterminding the hijacking in 1985 of a TWA plane during which a US serviceman was beaten, killed and thrown onto the tarmac of Beirut airport.

Mughnieh was also linked by Washington to the bombing of the US Marine barracks at Beirut airport in 1983, in which 241 American servicemen perished.

Strength
Several thousand supporters and a few hundred terrorist operatives.

Location/Area of Operation
Operates in the southern suburbs of Beirut, the Bekaa Valley, and southern Lebanon. Has established cells in Europe, Africa, South America, North America, and Asia.

External Aid
Receives financial, training, weapons, explosives, political, diplomatic, and organizational aid from Iran, and diplomatic, political, and logistical support from Syria. Hizballah also receives funding from charitable donations and business interests.

Statement of purpose from The Hizbullah Press Office

Hizbullah is an Islamic freedom fighting movement founded after the Israeli military seizure of Lebanon in 1982, which resulted in immediate formation of the Islamic resistance units for the liberation of the occupied territories and for the expulsion of the aggressive Israelis forces.

In addition to shouldering the burden of resisting the Israelis occupation as it is stated by the international Bill of Human Rights, Hizbullah is also concerned about the presentation of Islam which addresses the mind, and reasons. Hizbullah is concerned about Presenting Islam that is confident of its fundamentals, its highly civilized understanding of Man, life and the universe, Islam as being self-assured about its capability to achieve the basis of right and justice. We are anxious to present Islam as being open hearted to all nations their various political and cultural trends and their mumerous experiences, away from subjection or bewilderment. We are anxious to present Islam as being the guardian for human rights defining choices, adopting convictions and expressing them, socially. We opt for the formation of political pressure in education, pedagogy, medical case and other social benefits announced in the Bill of Human Rights. We are anxious to define the priorities for our cultural project that utilizes persuasiveness and polarization through the civilized and the human methods confirmed by the Bill of the Human Rights. Away from evidence force, and coercion. We are anxious to offer a model of performance in struggling targeting the enemy that represents a challenge for the existence of the whole nation along with its regimes and people. We also circumvent conflicts that do not serve the main aim, fighting the enemy, or that could create discord at the front, which is to be unified around the common interests. The hope is to rid of the pressuring threats pactised by the foreign zionist entity which has been thrust upon the Islamic and the Arab contemporany nation . It should be clear that the kind of Islam we want is a civilized endeavour that rejects injustice, humiliation, slavery, subjugation , colonism and blackmail while we stretch out our arms for communication among nations on the basis of mutual respect . The Islam we mean is the religion that never accepts control or delegation by others for the sake of manipulating the rights and the interests of the nation . The Islam we mean is the religion that recommends communication among civilization and rejects devisive collision between those civilizations. An Islam that believes in cultural communication among nations and refuses setting up barriers and embargos and sees that it is our right to remove those barriers by the diplomatic means, however, when others intend to launch wars against it, Hizbullah finds it a natural right to defend itself representing the supporters the their achievements .

Islam that we understand is a message that aims at establishing justice, security, peace and rights for all people no matter what nation, race or religion they belong. We don't have any complex toward others, but we feel the responsibility toward them, to make them understand the essence of our religion away from obligation and fanaticism.

We don't seek the application of Islam by force or violence but by peaceful political action, which gives the opportunity for the majority in any society to adopt or rejectit. If Islam becomes the choice of the majority then we will apply it, if not, we will continue to coexist and discuss till we reach correct beliefs.

We hereby affirm that our Islam rejects violence as a method to gain Power, and this should be the formula for the nonislamists as well.

Source: United States Department of State, CIA Factbook,Yale Law school