Bulgaria links Hezbollah to bombing of Israelis

A truck carries the bus damaged by the suicide bomb blast which targeted a group of Israeli tourists, at the airport in Bourgas, Bulgaria, on July 19, 2012. / NIKOLAY DOYCHINOV/AFP/Getty Images

SOFIA, Bulgaria Hezbollah is behind an attack on a bus filled with Israeli tourists in Bulgaria last year, investigators said Tuesday, describing a sophisticated bombing carried out by a terrorist cell that included Canadian and Australian citizens.

In the first major announcement in the investigation into the July 18 bombing that killed five Israelis and their Bulgarian driver, Interior Minister Tsvetan Tsvetanov said one of the suspects entered the country with a Canadian passport, and another with one from Australia.

"We have well-grounded reasons to suggest that the two were members of the militant wing of Hezbollah," Tsvetanov said after a meeting of Bulgaria's National Security Council. "We expect the government of Lebanon to assist in the further investigation."

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Within hours, Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati condemned the attack and said his country would cooperate fully.

Hezbollah, a Shiite militant group and political party that emerged in response to Israel's 1982 invasion of Lebanon, has been linked to attacks and kidnappings on Israeli and Jewish interests around the world.

The group has denied involvement in the Bulgaria bombing, and Hezbollah officials in Beirut declined further comment Tuesday. Hezbollah officials as a rule leave it to their leader, Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah, to comment on security issues.

The bomb exploded as the bus took a group of Israeli tourists from the airport to their hotel in the Black Sea resort of Burgas. The blast also killed the suspected bomber, a tall and lanky pale-skinned man wearing a baseball cap and dressed like a tourist.

Although it was initially believed to be a suicide bombing, Europol Director Rob Wainwright told The Associated Press that investigators now believe the bomber never intended to die. He said a Europol expert who analyzed a fragment of a circuit board recovered from the scene determined that it was detonated remotely.

The investigators found no links to Iran, which Israel had accused of playing a role in the attack.

The findings increased pressure on Europe to declare Hezbollah to be a terrorist organization, as the United States and Canada do.

"The attack in Burgas was an attack on European land against a member of the European Union," Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said. "We hope the Europeans learn the proper conclusions from this about the true character of Hezbollah."

The White House called on Europe to take "proactive action" to disrupt Hezbollah. Counterterrorism adviser John Brennan, who is President Barack Obama's nominee to run the Central Intelligence Agency, said Europe and other international partners should seek to uncover Hezbollah's infrastructure and disrupt the group's finances and operational network.

Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird went further.

"We urge the European Union and all partners who have not already done so to list Hezbollah as a terrorist entity and prosecute terrorist acts committed by this inhumane organization to the fullest possible extent," he said, adding that Canada would work with Bulgarian authorities given the apparent involvement of "a dual national living in Lebanon."

Catherine Ashton, the European Union's top foreign and security official, said the EU needs to assess the implications of the investigation seriously but stressed that any decision on adding Hezbollah to the EU list of terrorist organizations would require a unanimous decision by the foreign ministers of the 27 EU countries, whose next scheduled meeting is Feb. 18. Such a move would freeze Hezbollah assets and cut off funding.

France and Germany, wary of coming under increased pressure to do so, had pressured investigators not to publicly name Hezbollah as responsible for the bombing, according to a U.S. official who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the news media.

The investigators' reports offered the first glimpse at how the bombing was carried out.

Wainwright - whose organization helps coordinate national police across the EU, which includes Bulgaria - said in an interview that two counterfeit U.S. driver's licenses that were found near the bombing scene were made in Lebanon. The investigators, he said, found no direct links to Iran or to any al-Qaida-affiliated terror group.

"The Bulgarian authorities are making quite a strong assumption that this is the work of Hezbollah," Wainwright said. "From what I've seen of the case - from the very strong, obvious links to Lebanon, from the modus operandi of the terrorist attack and from other intelligence that we see - I think that is a reasonable assumption."

For Hezbollah, the accusation comes at a horrible time.

Despite its formidable weapons arsenal and political clout in Lebanon, the group's credibility and maneuvering space has been significantly reduced in recent years, largely because of the war in neighboring Syria but also because of unprecedented challenges at home.

Hezbollah still suffers from the fallout of a month-long 2006 war with Israel, in which it was blamed by many in the country for provoking an unnecessary conflict by kidnapping soldiers from the border area.

Since then, the group has come under increasing pressure at home to disarm, leading to sectarian tensions between Lebanese Shiite Hezbollah supporters and Sunni supporters from the opposing camp that have often spilled into deadly street fighting.

More recently, Hezbollah's support for the government of Syrian President Bashar Assad has proved costly to its reputation, and last week Israeli warplanes bombed what was believed to be a shipment of sophisticated anti-aircraft missiles headed to Hezbollah.

New troubles for Hezbollah could also add to Iran's international isolation. The Iranian regime is already under international sanctions for its suspect nuclear program, and has seen its position weaken due to its close ties with the Syrian regime. Its association with Hezbollah will likely further hurt Iran's international image.

Wainwright warned the attack, along with a wave of attacks against Israelis around the world in the past year, is an indication of a real threat to Israelis and Jews in Europe.

"Even if it's not Hezbollah, it has still obviously been carried out by an organization with some capability in the world, so the threat remains," Wainwright said. "I don't want to exaggerate the scale of that threat, but I think law enforcement authorities - government authorities - should take notice of this incident and prepare for the possibility at least of similar attacks in Europe."

[MCR5]

Does anyboby know what happen to those members of the Mossad that used fake passports to enter UAE and killed a member of the PLO. What comes around, goes around.

[MCR5]

HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA, that's very funny

[Aussie_convict]

List of Mossads "Defensive Assassinations

1950sDate Place Target Description Action Killer
July 13, 1956 Gaza Strip Mustafa Hafez Egyptian Army Lieutenant-Colonel responsible for recruiting refugees to carry out attacks in Israel. Parcel bomb
July 14, 1956 Amman Salah Mustafa Egyptian Military attache Parcel bomb

1960sDate Place Target Description Action Killer
September 11, 1962 Munich, Germany Heinz Krug West German rocket scientist working for Egypt's missile program Abducted from his company offices on Munich's Schillerstrasse, his body was never found. Swiss police later arrested two Mossad agents for threatening the daughter of another scientist and found that they were responsible for the killing. Part of Operation Damocles. Mossad
November 28, 1962 Heluan, Egypt 5 Egyptian factory workers Workers employed at Factory 333, an Egyptian rocket factory. Letter bomb sent bearing Hamburg post mark. Another such bomb disfigured and blinded a secretary. Part of Operation Damocles. Mossad
February 23, 1965 Montevideo, Uruguay Herberts Cukurs Aviator who had been involved in the murders of Latvian Jews during the Holocaust Lured to and killed in Montevideo by agents under the false pretense of starting an aviation business. Mossad

1970sDate Place Target Description Action Killer
July 25, 1972 Beirut Attempted killing of Bassam Abu Sharif Member of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine who held a press conference with Ghassan Kanafani during the Dawson's Field hijackings justifying the PFLP's actions. He lost four fingers, and was left deaf in one ear and blind in one eye, after a book sent to him that was implanted with a bomb exploded in his hands. Mossad
October 16, 1972 Rome Abdel Wael Zwaiter Libyan embassy employee and PLO representative, considered by Israel to be a terrorist for his alleged role in the Black September group and the Munich massacre Shot by two gunmen in his apartment. Mossad
July 8, 1972 Beirut Ghassan Kanafani Palestinian writer and a leading member of the PFLP, and claimed to be one of the planners behind the Lod Airport massacre Killed by car bomb. Mossad
December 8, 1972 Paris Mahmoud Hamshari PLO representative in France and coordinator of the Munich Olympic Games massacre. Killed by bomb concealed in his telephone.
January 24, 1973 Nicosia Hussein Al Bashir Fatah representative in Nicosia, Cyprus Killed by bomb in his hotel room bed.
April 6, 1973 Paris Basil Al-Kubaissi PFLP member and American University of Beirut law professor Killed by two gunmen.
April 9, 1973 Beirut Muhammad Youssef Al-Najjar Black September Operations officer and PLO official Killed during Operation Spring of Youth. Sayeret Matkal
April 9, 1973 Beirut Kamal Adwan Black September commander and member of the Fatah central committee Killed during Operation Spring of Youth. Sayeret Matkal
April 9, 1973 Beirut Kamal Nasser PLO spokesman Killed during Operation Spring of Youth. Sayeret Matkal
April 11, 1973 Athens Zaiad Muchasi Fatah representative to Cyprus Killed in hotel room.
June 28, 1973 Paris Mohammad Boudia Black September operations officer Killed by pressure-activated mine under his car seat.
July 21, 1973 Lillehammer, Norway Attempted killing of Ali Hassan Salameh High-ranked leader in the PLO and Black September who was behind the 1972 Munich Olympic Games massacre Ahmed Bouchiki, an innocent waiter believed to be Ali Hassan Salameh, killed by gunmen. Known as the Lillehammer affair. Mossad
March 28, 1978 German Democratic Republic Wadie Haddad PFLP commander, who masterminded several plane hijackings in the 1960s and 1970s. Killed by a poisoned chocolate, sent to him, which caused his death several months later. Claimed to be Mossad (Israel never claimed responsibility)
July 26, 1979 Cannes Zuheir Mohsen Leader of the pro-Syria as-Sa'iqa faction of the Palestine Liberation Organization Shot in the front of casino. Mossad
January 22, 1979 Beirut Ali Hassan Salameh High-ranked leader in the PLO and Black September who was behind the 1972 Munich Olympic Games massacre Killed by car bomb, along with four bodyguards and four innocent bystanders. Mossad