IDF: Sanctions on Iran hurt its aid to Hezbollah

by The Associated Press and Israel Hayom Staff

Iran is a central factor in arming and training Hezbollah inside Lebanon and in camps in Iran, but the flow of aid has diminished from four or five years ago, says a military official.

Hezbollah has been receiving less aid from Iran due to the effect international sanctions are having on the Islamic Republic, according to a senior IDF official. Photo credit: AP

International sanctions are forcing Iran to cut back aid to its anti-Israel Hezbollah allies in Lebanon, but the Lebanese group remains a potent force, a top Israeli military official said Monday.

He said Hezbollah’s arsenal was now far larger and more sophisticated than it was during the 2006 Second Lebanon War, when it fired thousands of rockets at Israel.

The official said Israel remained worried that Syrian arsenals of chemical weapons might be raided by militants including Hezbollah, which is also backed by the Syrian regime. At present the government in Syria, which borders both Israel and Lebanon, appears to be maintaining control over its chemical weapons arsenals, he said.

“There are no signs now” that chemical weapons are being moved out of secure government warehouses, he said. But he said Israel fears “that could change overnight” because of the chaos of Syria’s civil war.

The official, a senior officer in the northern command, spoke with foreign reporters on condition of anonymity under military rules.

There was no immediate reaction from Hezbollah.

Iran is a central factor in arming and training Hezbollah inside Lebanon and in camps in Iran, but the flow of aid has diminished compared to four or five years back, the military official said.

“Sanctions have hurt the amount of aid Hezbollah receives from Iran,” he said, without providing evidence to back up his claims. He said aid remained a “significant amount,” estimating it at hundreds of millions of dollars a year. Western sanctions, aimed at forcing Iran to curtail its nuclear development program, have hit Iran’s economy hard and cut off access to most international financial networks. 

The West suspects Iran might be aiming to build nuclear weapons. Iran maintains its nuclear program is peaceful, intended mainly to produce energy. Israel considers Iran to be its most dangerous enemy, in part because of its nuclear program and its support for Hezbollah and Hamas, a Palestinian terrorist group that controls the Gaza Strip on Israel’s southern border.

Other Israeli officials have estimated that Hezbollah possesses more than 40,000 rockets and missiles capable of striking anywhere in Israel. In addition to its military clout – which surpasses that of Lebanon’s official army – Hezbollah has developed into a key political force in Lebanon, holding the balance of power in the country’s cabinet.

The official said should Israel find itself warring with Hezbollah again – for instance, if it were to carry out a mega-attack on Israelis abroad – then Israel would significantly scale back its use of cluster bombs. Its use of the weapons in 2006 drew heavy international criticism.

Cluster bombs open in flight and scatter dozens of bomblets over wide areas. The U.N. and human rights groups have said Israel dropped about 4 million cluster bomblets during the 2006 Second Lebanon War. Up to 1 million failed to explode and now endanger civilians, according to U.N. demining experts.

“No doubt the use of cluster bombs would be much diminished,” the official said. “Because Hezbollah is in every Shiite village [in south Lebanon], because it is so entrenched in the population and underneath buildings, it’s not enough to send a bomb from the air there, be it from a gun or a plane.”

Soldiers would have to be sent in “at a relatively early stage,” and improved intelligence had allowed Israel to identify many targets, he said.

The Associated Press and Israel Hayom Staff

Source: http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_article.php?id=6243

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