Fighting Terrorism on the financial front

WASHINGTON, Dec. 6 (UPI) -- The United States Treasury Department has asked the World Bank to prepare a study on the financial status of terrorist organizations around the world, with a particular emphasis on Lebanon's Hezbollah, a high-ranking Arab diplomat told United Press International Thursday.

UPI has learned World Bank President James Wolfensohn had received a request from the U.S. government, asking the world financial institution to find out what measures each country was undertaking to comply with President George W. Bush's demands all financial assets related to terror outfits and terrorist actions be frozen.

The World Bank, the sources told UPI, replied it was not their role to be "a financial police," and that the United Nations would be more qualified to carry out such investigative studies. Nonetheless, there is a move currently underway by the World Bank, the Treasury Department and the Bank for International Settlement to investigate terrorist funds, according a World Bank source who asked not to be named. BIS is based in Basel, Switzerland.

The Arab diplomat said the United States has told the World Bank the study should propose reforms needed to deny finances to terrorist groups, rather than to encourage sanctions against the countries involved.

One group the United States is particularly interested in at this time is Lebanon's Hezbollah organization, which has been responsible for a slew of anti-American attacks in past 20 years. Those included the 1983 bombing of the U.S. Marine barracks near Beirut's airport that left 241 Marines dead, the hijacking of a TWA airliner and the killing of a U.S. Navy diver, as well as the 1983 bombing of the American embassy in Lebanon where a large number of CIA operatives who were meeting in the embassy at the time were killed.

Hezbollah today claims to have turned a new leaf and affirms to be solely engaged in "resistance" actions against Israel. The Shiite organization was instrumental in forcing Israel to withdraw from south Lebanon after more than two decades of occupation. Today, Hezbollah, the Shiite militant Party of God, is changing its spots, transforming itself into a political party with 12 lawfully elected deputies to the Lebanese Parliament, that include a Christian politician on their slate. While Hezbollah remains the only Lebanese organization still allowed to carry weapons, they also are actively engaged in setting up social programs, such as schools and hospitals, especially in the south of the country, where the Lebanese government still has not reclaimed the void left by Israel's long occupation of the area.

Hezbollah, the group's leadership claims, is still resisting Israeli occupation of a part of south Lebanon called the Shebaa Farms. Israel claims the land belongs to Syria. The Lebanese government, and in fact a large percentage of the Lebanese population today, view Hezbollah as a "resistance group." There is a "national consensus on that," the Arab diplomat told UPI.

While the United States views Hezbollah as a "terrorist organization because of its global reach," he said the United States might eventually accept the group's legitimacy pending certain caveats. The United States for example, wants three Lebanese terror suspects -- including Imad Mughniyah -- who have been placed on the FBI's Most Wanted Terrorist list.

Mughniyah, according to American and Israeli intelligence reports, was the instigator and perpetrator of several attacks against American and Israeli interests, including the Marine barracks bombing.

Recently, there has been some uneasiness in certain diplomatic circles that U.S.-endorsed economic sanctions against Lebanon will hit the country's economy where it matters most, by attacking its banking system.

"Economically speaking, Lebanon is walking on the side of a cliff," said one diplomat.

"Military intervention against Hezbollah is unrealistic," said an Arab official who asked not to be named. "They are a ghost association. They are mainly political today. Militarily, they don't represent much. They maintain a few low-grade training facilities in the Bekaa Valley which have no military value."

Unlike Hamas or Islamic Jihad, which have carried out numerous suicide attacks in Israel that have claimed dozens of civilian lives, Hezbollah's recent actions have been aimed at Israeli military targets. And that is one aspect the United States is keeping a very close eye on.

As the "first phase" of the war on terrorism is nearing the end with the apparent defeat of the Taliban, Middle East analysts are trying to work out what the "next phase" of the war on terror is likely to be. Both Iraq and Syria are on the list of potential future U.S. targets. Syria actively supports Hezbollah.