Hezballah banks bombed

Adam Ciralsky & Lisa Myers:

Fifteen hundred times in the past two weeks, an Israeli jet has taken off with a load of bombs. But as NBC News has learned, the targets have not just been military.

Israeli intelligence sources tell NBC News that among the targets hit in Lebanon are as many as a dozen financial institutions — part of a previously secret campaign to destroy Hezbollah's financial infrastructure. Some banks were demolished, others deliberately damaged but not destroyed. In one case, Israel also took out a bank manager's home.

In an exclusive interview, Israel's top counter-terror official says these attacks are a warning.

"The message is for all the Lebanese banks,” says Brig. Gen. Dani Arditi, advisor to the Israeli Prime Minister for Counterterrorism. “Assistance to Hezbollah is direct assistance to terrorist organizations."

Among the targets: Eight offices of Hezbollah's unofficial treasury, called Beit el Mal. The Israelis claim the attacks caught Hezbollah by surprise.

"We know that they are looking for money. They are very desperate to have some cash and they don’t have [it],” Arditi says.

The Israelis say they also struck branches of two major banks — Al Baraka and Fransabank — which they claim help Hezbollah receive and move money around the world. A senior bank official at Al Baraka confirms one of his branches was bombed, and says several other nearby banks were hit, too. Arditi tells NBC News that a third bank — the Middle East and Africa Bank — also is on Israel's hit list.

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The Middle East Africa Bank has a relationship with the U.S. bank Wachovia. After NBC News informed Wachovia of the Hezbollah fundraising appeal, Wachovia immediately terminated the relationship.

In a statement, a Wachovia spokesman said, "Wachovia confirms that it has very stringent procedures and policies in place to monitor accounts and ensure compliance with the Patriot Act, including not conducting business with any organization identified by the U.S. government as a terrorist organization or supporting terrorism."

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Tuesday, the head of the Corporate Banking Division of the Lebanese-French Bank (Banque Libano-Française) informed NBC News that it had closed the account that the Hezbollah facilitator had set up at his bank.

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Looks like NBC successfully shut down two Hezballah back door fund raising operations in the US. Good for them. Starving terrorist funding makes it more difficult for them to maintain their operations which have been huge in Lebanon. With Israel's attacks on the banks dealing with Hezballah, it will take them a while to reconstitute their flow of funds.

James Taranto indicates that viewers watching some NBC video on one of the bombed banks spotted what is very likely bogus sheets of US $100 bills. He also included this unrelated items that is just too funny to pass up:

A Headline We Can't Improve On
"Army Officer Arrested for Fondling Privates"--headline, Chosun Ilbo (South Korea), July 24

I guessing they were not his.