Iran: Leading State Sponsor of TerrorIran is widely recognized as the world's leading state sponsor of international terrorism. Both directly and indirectly, Iran funds, trains and arms groups that share the regime's stated goal of destroying the state of Israel. These groups include Hezbollah, Palestinian Islamic Jihad and Hamas. [1] Iran offers similar support to the Taliban and to Shia insurgent groups, which have inflicted casualties on American, British and other forces in Afghanistan and Iraq. [2] [3] Iran is expanding its terror network to the West, relying on Hezbollah and splinter groups of Iran's Revolutionary Guard to recruit and train sleeper cells in foreign capitals. [4] The terror network that Iran created and continues to sustain, combined with the regime's intransigence over its ambitions to become a nuclear power, pose an ominous threat and constitute a growing concern for the international community. [5] Iran poses different kinds of threats to different nations and regions across the globe. The Shia terrorist group Hezbollah, which operates mainly out of Lebanon, is Tehran's primary weapon against Israel and the West. Iran helped found, organize and train Hezbollah and gives the group $100 to $200 million a year. It also continues to provide arms to the group, despite the demands of U.N. Security Council Resolution 1701. [6] Since the Hezbollah-Israel war, Iran has replenished Hezbollah's cache of Katyusha and longer-range rockets, and has supplied more advanced anti-tank weapons and surface-to-air rockets. [7] Hezbollah maintains close ties with Islamic Revolutionary Corps officials, who are under the command of Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khameini. [8] Iran supports Palestinian terror groups opposed to a peaceful solution to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. [9] It gives Hamas $20 million a year, [10] and it provided an additional $50 million after Hamas won control of the Palestinian Authority in 2006. [11] Iran also provided Hamas members with intensive military training in the weeks and months leading up to the group's takeover of the Gaza Strip. [12] During the war in Gaza, more than 70,000 Iranian college students from universities throughout Iran volunteered to serve as suicide bombers to carry out attacks against Israel. This rush of volunteerism came after Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, delivered a religious decree stating that anyone who carried out an attack against Israel to protect Palestinians in Gaza would be considered a martyr. [13] Iraq Iran has worked hard to fuel violence in Iraq. Iran supports Shia insurgents by giving them about $3 million per month in funding, as well as training and increasingly advanced weapons. [14] Of greatest concern to American soldiers are Iranian-supplied explosively formed penetrators (EFP's).The weapons were responsible for 18 percent of American combat deaths in the last quarter of 2006, and 30 percent in Shiite-dominated areas. [15] In July 2007, Iran planned an operation that killed five American servicemen, according to the U.S. Army. [16] Shia groups now use Fajr-3 rockets bearing the markings of Iran's Revolutionary Guard that are dated 2007 (Hezbollah also receives the Fajr-3). [17] Iran also stokes Iraq's infighting, and to that end, has begun arming Sunni groups as well. [18] Afghanistan Iran has shrewdly armed the Taliban's campaign against NATO forces and civilians in Afghanistan even as it publicly supports the government of Hamid Karzai. [19] British intelligence reported Iran is providing the Taliban 107mm mortars, rocket-propelled grenades, C-4 explosives and small arms. [20] [21] Iran also gave the Taliban surface-to-air missiles, which they have used against British troops. [22] Europe and beyond European Union (E.U.) officials have identified 800 Iran-backed Hezbollah terrorists residing in Germany and sleeper cells in 20 E.U. nations. Hezbollah cells are utilizing key European capitals as intelligence-gathering centers. Europe serves as a popular location for Hezbollah operatives to conduct fundraising activities that accrue an estimate $198 million a year. [23] Iran has worked directly and through proxies, namely small groups linked to the Iran Revolutionary Guards, to recruit potential suicide bombers to attack Israel, Europe and the United States. Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has praised martyrdom as an "eternal art." [24] The Committee for the Commemoration of Martyrs of the Global Islamic Campaign, backed by the regime and linked with the Iran Revolutionary Guards, has reportedly enlisted 40,000 people to carry out suicide attacks. [25] A division within the Islamic Revolutionary Guards seeks to recruit Iranians to commit acts of terror abroad. Footnotes [1] O'Toole, Pam, "Rice: Iran is terrorism 'banker'," BBC News, Feb. 17, 2006, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/4722498.stm, accessed July 7, 2006 |
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