Iraqis: Hezbollah Trained Shiite Militants

2 Lawmakers, Army Officer Say Iran Backing Group Training Fighters To Gain Influence

(AP)  Hezbollah instructors trained Shiite militiamen at remote camps in southern Iraq until three months ago when they slipped across the border to Iran - presumably to continue instruction on Iranian soil, according to two Shiite lawmakers and a top army officer.

The three Iraqis claim the Lebanese Shiites were also involved in planning some of the most brazen attacks against U.S.-led forces, including the January 2007 raid on a provincial government compound in Karbala in which five Americans died.

The allegations, made in separate interviews with The Associated Press, point not only to an Iranian hand in the Iraq war, but also to Hezbollah's willingness to expand beyond its Lebanese base and assume a broader role in the struggle against U.S. influence in the Middle East.

All this suggests that Shiite-dominated Iran is waging a proxy war against the United States to secure a dominant role in majority-Shiite Iraq, which has supplanted Lebanon as Tehran's top priority in the Middle East.

"The stakes are much higher in Iraq, where there is a Shiite majority, oil, the shrine cities and borders with Saudi Arabia," said analyst Farid al-Khazen, a Christian Lebanese lawmaker whose party is allied with Hezbollah.

"The big story is Iraq, and the Americans unwittingly opened it up for the Iranians" by their invasion in 2003, al-Khazen said.

The allegations come as the United States and Iran are engaged in a showdown over Tehran's nuclear program and each country's role in Iraq.

Iran, Hezbollah's mentor, denies giving any support to Shiite extremists in Iraq.

But the three Iraqis who spoke to the AP said the Iranians prefer to use Hezbollah instructors because as Arabs, they can communicate better with the Iraqi Shiites and maintain a lower profile than Farsi-speakers from Iran.

For Hezbollah, a high-risk role in Iraq could give the Lebanese movement leverage with the United States and broaden its appeal within the Arab world where anti-American sentiment remains strong.

Iraqi officials have said little about a Hezbollah role in this country. However, President Jalal Talabani told U.S.-funded Alhurra television this week that "there have been several occasions" when Hezbollah members or those who "claim to belong to Hezbollah" have been detained in Iraq.

He gave no further details.

But the two Iraqi lawmakers and the military officer said Hezbollah instructors work only with members of the Iraqi Shiite "special groups," the U.S. military's name for splinter factions of anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr's Mahdi Army militia. The U.S. believes that Iran's elite Quds Force, a branch of Iran's Revolutionary Guard, supports the special groups.

All three Iraqis spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not supposed to release the information.

The lawmakers belong to al-Sadr's movement and were involved in the creation of the Mahdi Army in 2003. The military officer's job gives him access to highly classified intelligence information.

They said Hezbollah began training Shiite militiamen in the second half of 2006 at two camps - Deir and Kutaiban - east of Basra near the Iranian border. They fled across the border in late March or early April this year after U.S.-backed Iraqi forces launched a crackdown against militias in Basra, Iraq's second-largest city.

In Iran, training resumed in camps once used by Iraqi exiles who fought with Iranian forces during the 1980s war between the two countries, the lawmakers said. Instruction includes explosives, ambushes and use of rockets and mortars.

Citing testimony from special groups members in custody, the officer said the Hezbollah instructors never numbered more than 10 at any one time, kept a low profile and moved back and forth over the Iranian border.

Indications that Hezbollah was playing a role in Iraq first surfaced last July when the U.S. military announced the arrest of Ali Musa Daqduq, a Lebanese-born Hezbollah operative allegedly training Iraqi Shiite militiamen.

At least one other Hezbollah operative, identified only as Faris, was detained in Basra during fighting there in April and was handed over to the Americans, the Iraqi military officer said.

The U.S. military has said little publicly about Hezbollah's involvement here since announcing Daqduq's arrest, though it has frequently alleged an Iranian role in arming, equipping and training Shiite extremists.

"At this point in time, we do not have any new, releasable information regarding Hezbollah's involvement with special groups in Iran and Iraq," a military spokesman, Capt. Charles Calio, said in an e-mail to the AP.

A Hezbollah spokesman in Beirut, Lebanon, refused to comment on any role for his organization.

However, Ibrahim al-Ameen, a Lebanese newspaper editor close to Hezbollah, said in a recent interview in Beirut that Hezbollah's leader, Sheik Hassan Nasrallah, spends several hours daily dealing with "the situation in Iraq."

Nasrallah, who studied Shiite theology in Iraq, spoke at length about Iraqi "resistance" during a speech last May that analysts believed was aimed at bolstering his image as a godfather of Arab opposition to the United States and Israel throughout the Middle East.

Beside its alleged role in Iraq, Hezbollah is known to have ties to the Palestinian militant Hamas group. The charismatic Nasrallah has become a sort of folk hero in the mostly Sunni Arab world after his guerrillas fought Israeli forces to a standstill in a 34-day war in 2006.

A senior Western diplomat based in the Middle East said his government has information suggesting a growing Hezbollah interest in events in Iraq. However, the diplomat would say no more and insisted on anonymity because the subject is so sensitive.

Hezbollah's possible role in direct attacks against U.S.-led forces is murkier and more explosive.

The two Iraqi lawmakers said Hezbollah operatives planned and supervised both the Karbala attack and the brazen daylight kidnapping of five British nationals from a Finance Ministry compound in Baghdad in May 2007. The Britons are still being held.

In the Karbala attack, English-speaking militants wearing American uniforms and carrying American weapons stormed the compound, killing one U.S. soldier and abducting four. The four were later found dead.

A senior Mahdi Army commander in Baghdad, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the information, said Hezbollah's operations in Iraq had been supervised by Imad Mughniyeh, a top commander of the guerrilla group killed in a car bomb in Syria last February.

The shadowy figure was suspected of a role in the 1983 bombing of the U.S. Marine barracks in Beirut and the 1992 attack on the Israeli Embassy in Buenos Aires, Argentina.

[leftyintexas]

I''m sure the militias are getting help from every country in the Middle East (excluding Israel of course). So this is not real news to most people. The right wing nuts are probably the only ones who think this story is news worthy.

[whiskyrocker]

Peace and tranquility in the middle east.

[babooph]

Ah an article from US "news"-Jewish Israelis can carry machine guns-Islamics cannot pick up rocks-Islamics are then called "gunmen"-only the most brainwashed can trust ANYTHING from US "news"-they just do their masters bidding.

[trishab4]

"Iraqis: Hezbollah Trained Shiite Militants
2 Lawmakers, Army Officer Say Iran Backing Group Training Fighters To Gain Influence"

According to j-whitman,hungry1968,MCVet and other terrorist apologists this story is false. According to those far-left Iran is not destabilizing Iraq, a stable Iraq is of Iran interest and also the weapons that are killing US troops are not Iranian made and Hezbollah doesnt have a finger in Iraq.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Posted by BagdadsHere2 at 08:06 PM : Jul 02, 2008

-And bagodeadshere2 is saying Bush told all truth before invading Iraq, remember Alzzzzheimer sufferer?

[trishab4]

-Big News! Now who is more of a thug? is it Zionists'''''''' Bush/DicckCheney''''''''s administration or the Hezbollah party?

Posted by trishab4 at 06:54 PM : Jul 02, 2008

if you don''''t already know, there''''s no use telling ya''''
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Posted by badaxmofo at 07:06 PM : Jul 02, 2008

-badassmofo, see I didn''t ask you who is uglier? Jane or Cheetah! Honey, Ye know!!!!

[latrocinor-2009]

Even a small, seemingly harmless, breed will turn vicious when they are part of a pack.

Posted by jn122736
..........
Yup, we all know about FARC

[latrocinor-2009]

Even a small, seemingly harmless, breed will turn vicious when they are part of a pack.

Posted by jn122736
..........
Yup, we all know about Moveon.org

[bagdadshere2]

"Iraqis: Hezbollah Trained Shiite Militants
2 Lawmakers, Army Officer Say Iran Backing Group Training Fighters To Gain Influence"

According to j-whitman,hungry1968,MCVet and other terrorist apologists this story is false. According to those far-left Iran is not destabilizing Iraq, a stable Iraq is of Iran interest and also the weapons that are killing US troops are not Iranian made and Hezbollah doesnt have a finger in Iraq.

[bagdadshere2]

Posted by FeelFree4U at 07:11 PM : Jul 02, 2008
+ report abu

FallFree4U,,,,Are you still a Muslim Girl proud of being raped,stoned,lashed and discriminated? Quit Islam , take off your Burka and enjoy your life.

[feelfree4u]

Good points, "floydzepp".

[feelfree4u]

jn122736,

Re: "Notice how well the Bush apologist (attack dogs) learned their tactics so well over the past eight years?"

I did. But fortunately many of the rest of us are familiar with them now too, and they now have far less effect, and are easily countered.

Re: "Dogs are just naturally more aggressive when traveling in packs."

"Even a small, seemingly harmless, breed will turn vicious when they are part of a pack."

Good analogy!;-)

[jn122736]

FeelFree4U:


Notice how well the Bush apologist (attack dogs) learned their tactics so well over the past eight years?

Dogs are just naturally more aggressive when traveling in packs.

Even a small, seemingly harmless, breed will turn vicious when they are part of a pack.

[jowand]

Iraqis: Hezbollah Trained Shiite Militants

The story should read Iraqis: Iranians Trained Shiite Terrorists.

Right FeelFree4U (aka Pork Chop)

[feelfree4u]

''Atta boy, "Latrocinor".

Surely people will believe you this time.

[latrocinor-2009]

Goodbye to all you fine people and the terrorist sympathyzer machine FeelFree4U.

Enjoy it''s lessons and examples of:

FeelFree4U uses Hitler propaganda philosophy:

"Make the lie big, make it simple, keep saying it, and eventually they will believe it."

--Adolf Hitler Leader of the Nazi party


FeelFree4U uses Nazii Joseph Goebbels propaganda techniques

"If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth is the greatest enemy of the State."

--Reich Minister of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda in Nazi Germany

Good Night and Good Luck

[latrocinor-2009]

wonder how many U.S. soldiers and Iraqis that Exxon-Mobil would endorse killing, maiming, and torturing, in order to boost its own profits?

Posted by FeelFree4U
.... ...... .....

Do you have any comments that are relevant to this article?

I thought not.

As I wade back through the irrelevant anti-USA and anti-Zionist and anti-oil company and anti-Israeli blather, character attacks, and subject-change efforts of you and your terrorist buddy FloydZepp.

[titletrack]

This goes without saying.

Posted by FeelFree4U


Poor Feel Free, he hates America and Israel and all he does is whine about it. When are you going to step up to the plate and do something constructive?

[latrocinor-2009]

FeelFree4U always tries to hide behind the "Freedom Fighters" to excuse their crimes and atrocities, even though most Freedom Fighters are not Freedom Fighters but support drug trafficking and kidnappings and murders.

Not surprising, FeelFree4U uses the only groups that we know of, for sure, that hide behind "human shields" as a matter of policy - and can say it''s not proven before their own Supreme Court, because they don''t have one.

[feelfree4u]

Latrocinor,

Re: "Do you have any comments that are relevant to this article?"

You will find some if you wade back through the irrelevant Zionist blather, character attacks, and subject-change efforts of you and your little Zionist buddy.

Re: "I thought not."

This goes without saying.

[jn122736]

Posted by FeelFree4U at 06:39 PM : Jul 02, 2008

since Oil companys work on a 4% profit margin and Iran makes far more of a profit every time Amadinijad sneezes whats your point besides the usual blaming the oil companys only ?

Posted by earth56 at 06:42 PM : Jul 02, 2008
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Is that 4% daily or weekly?