Page 189 - Encyclopedia Of Terrorism

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166———Hezbollah

that time, Hezbollah supported the transformation 1985, becoming one of the first Americans to be
of Lebanon into an Islamic state and collaborated with kidnapped. The former Marine was held in window-
Palestinian terrorist groups in their fight against Israel. less cells, often blindfolded or chained to the floor.
Many Hezbollah leaders had studied theology with Irish national Brian Keenan was abducted in April
Iranian clerics and maintained close ties to Iran during 1986 as he left his apartment to give a lecture at the
and after its 1979 revolution that brought the Ayatollah American University in Beirut. Four armed men threw
Ruhollah Khomeini to power. The group’s first leader, him into the back of an old Mercedes and took him
Secretary General Sheik Sobhi Tufeili (replaced in to a 4-by-6-foot cell, where he was held in solitary
May 1991) was famous for refusing to consider Leba- confinement.
non as a nation-state. Israeli agents assassinated his English journalist John McCarthy, who had traveled
successor, Abbas Musawi, in 1992. Current Hezbollah to Beirut to film a news feature on Keenan’s kidnap-
leaders include Secretary General Sheik Hassan ping, was himself abducted on the way to the airport.
Nasrallah and spiritual adviser Sheikh Mohamed The kidnappers later confined the two men together
Hussein Fadlallah. in a large room. Still later, Keenan and McCarthy
Hezbollah was first recognized with a representative were transferred to a dungeon in the Bekaa Valley
in Lebanon’s Parliament in 1992. The 128-member where they were imprisoned with Anderson, American
Parliament now has about a dozen Hezbollah members; University professor Thomas Sutherland, and Ameri-
the party also owns or funds several hospitals, schools, can Frank Reed. It was common for the captors to beat
cultural societies, and charities in Lebanon. Members all of the hostages on the feet, and some of them were
deliver drinking water to slums, repair roads, and feed chained for days on end.
the poor. Hezbollah also runs a weekly newspaper, Although the administration of U.S. president
Al-Ahid; a television channel, Al-Manar; and a radio Ronald Reagan had publicly promised not to negoti-
station, Al-Nour. ate with the terrorists, officials secretly negotiated
an arms-for-hostages deal with Iran. Professor David
Jacobsen, Father Lawrence Martin Jenco, and Rev.
WESTERN TARGETS
Benjamin Weir were released under the arrangement.
Early on, Hezbollah targeted Western institutions Congressional investigations into the deal, and charges
and individuals. U.S. officials maintain that former that the officials were channeling money from the arms
Hezbollah security chief Imad Mughniyah, who is one sales to the Contras in Nicaragua, led to the resignation
of the FBI’s “most wanted terrorists,” planned the 1983 of top administration officials. On December 4, 1991,
suicide truck bombings of the U.S. embassy in Beirut the terrorists released the last remaining captive,
and the attacks on the French and American military Anderson, bringing nearly a decade of hostage-related
headquarters in the city later that year. More than 350 turmoil and fear to an end.
people were killed in the suicide attacks, and the U.S. Although Hezbollah now denies all involvement in
Marines withdrew from Lebanon soon thereafter. the kidnappings, the prisoners told the media that
In the mid-1980s, Hezbollah began kidnapping they believed their kidnappers were affiliated with the
Westerners and holding them hostage, hoping to gain group. Some hostages talked about seeing pictures of
more influence in regional affairs and bargain for the Ayatollah Khomeini on the wall, reinforcing U.S. sus-
release of Shiites held in Israeli, Kuwaiti, or Western picions that Hezbollah remained closely aligned with
jails. Militants kidnapped, in separate instances, U.S., Iran. One of the Shiite prisoners that the kidnappers
British, Irish, French, Saudi, West German, and South demanded be released in exchange for the Westerners
Korean nationals. A splinter group called Islamic was Mustafa Badreddin, brother-in-law of Hezbollah’s
Jihad, later revealed to also be a front for Hezbollah, security chief Mughniyah. Held in a Kuwaiti jail,
publicly claimed responsibility for many of the kid- Badreddin and 16 other Shiite prisoners escaped
nappings. Ten of the hostages died in captivity, includ- during Iraq’s invasion of that country.
ing Beirut CIA station chief William Buckley. For In 1985, terrorists linked to Hezbollah hijacked
nearly a decade, the kidnappers fed dictated commu- TWA Flight 847, commandeering the plane as it trav-
niqués and orchestrated images to the media. eled from Athens to Rome. The plane flew between
Associated Press journalist Terry Anderson was Beirut and Algiers a number of times as the hijackers
seized at gunpoint in western Beirut on March 16, negotiated for the release of Shiite prisoners held