Its primary backer is Iran. But a lot of money comes from the Americas.

Iran is the biggest patron of Hezbollah, delivering $100 million or so a year to the terrorists, according to Senate testimony from Matthew Levitt, now a Treasury Department official. But like any enterprising criminal organization, the Party of God has worked hard to diversify its cash sources. The feds have long suspected it has profited from blood diamonds out of Africa, operating through expatriate Lebanese. It also turns out there are important financial channels right here in the States.

The money comes from, among other sources, illicit trade in tobacco and controlled substances. Last month Imad Hamadeh of Dearborn Heights, Mich. and Theodore Schenk of Miami Beach pleaded guilty to federal racketeering charges over their involvement in a cigarette-smuggling gang that avoided $20 million in sales taxes. According to federal prosecutors, the ring was also engaged in diverting funds to Hezbollah.
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Federal prosecutors in Michigan say Hezbollah gets more support in their area than any other Mideast terrorist group. That may have drawn Mahmoud Kourani, a Hezbollah money man, to Dearborn, Mich. after slipping into the U.S. illegally through the Mexican border. The brother of a Hezbollah general, Kourani hosted fundraisers for the Party of God before he pleaded guilty last year to materially supporting the group.
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South America is a viper’s nest of terrorist financing.
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