Background: The Iran-Hezbollah Relationship

• When Israel invaded Lebanon in 1982 with the aim of eliminating the Palestinian Liberation Organization's (PLO) use of the area as a base of operations for attacking Israel, the various radical Shiite groups operating there united against Israel's army with the training, arming and funding of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard.  [1] The united group of Shiites became Hezbollah.
• Hezbollah's charter calls for the formation of a Shiite theocracy in Lebanon based on the values of the Iranian Revolution. [2]
• Iran's support of Hezbollah stems from a shared religious ideology, a common desire to destroy Israel, end all Western influence in the region, an aspiration to strengthen its hold in the Middle East and battle the West. [3]
• Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khomeini is regarded by Hezbollah as its ultimate leader, and the group maintains close ties with Iran's leadership, especially the hard-line clerics who helped organize the party in the early 1980s. [4]
• The creation of Hezbollah allowed Iran to wage war with Israel by using it as a proxy militant organization based in Lebanon with cells in the United States and the rest of the Western world. [5]
  
  

After lying about not supporting Hezbollah, Iran publicly stated that it supports Hezbollah for being part of "the historic struggle against the Zionist cancer and the USA."

Iran's Assistance to Hezbollah

Iran supports Hezbollah financially, militarily and ideologically. Militarily, Iran helps train guerrilla fighters, and delivers and purchases weapons for Hezbollah. Financially, Iranian funding enables Hezbollah to offer social services to the local communities and run a media empire. Ideologically, Iran and Hezbollah have similar shared goals and a vested effort to spread Islam and oppose the Western world. Iran transfers nearly $100 million annually to Hezbollah through the Qods Force, the Iranian Foreign Ministry, charities and its embassies in Damascus and Beirut. [6]

Evidence of Military and Financial Support

• The elite Iranian Revolutionary Guard unit, the Qods Force, is responsible for training, arming, and providing Hezbollah intelligence on Israel. [7] 
• Written material captured from Hezbollah during the war Israel fought in summer 2006 against Lebanon-based Hezbollah guerrillas included a great deal of information relating to Iranian ideology as well as radical Shia ideas born of the Iranian Revolution. [8]
• Captured Hezbollah militants have confessed that Iran runs training camps for Hezbollah and other militant groups within its borders, managed by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, as well as other high-ranking Iranian officials. [9]
• Iran provides Hezbollah with intelligence on Israel, technical assistance in weapons operation, training in Iranian camps, weapons including long-range Fajr rockets, anti-aircraft and anti-tank missiles, guns, rocket launchers and drone planes, many of which were used by Hezbollah during the 2006 Hezbollah-Israel conflict. [10]
• Iran finances Hezbollah's official television station, Al-Manar, which was founded in 1991 and broadcasts extremist Islamic and heavily anti-Western material. [11]
• Monetary aid to Hezbollah from Iran actually increased after Israel's disengagement from Lebanon in 2000 [12] as Iran began building up Hezbollah as a stronger military force, preparing it for a conflict with Israel culminating in the Hezbollah-Israel conflict. [13]
• Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah stated in an interview that "Iran assists the organization with money, weapons, and training, motivated by a religious fraternity and ethnic solidarity."

A Shared Hostility toward Israel

Since Ayatollah Khomeini seized power in Iran's 1979 revolution, the Islamic Republic has been consistently hostile toward Israel, a belief that Hezbollah also espouses. This  hostility became particularly evident when Hezbollah began firing hundreds of rockets into northern Israel in summer 2006, leading to Israel's 34-day defensive war against Hezbollah. [14]

"[Israel is] a cancer that        needs to be removed at  its roots." - Hassan Nasrallah, Dec. 22, 2000 [15]

"With God's help, the countdown button for the destruction of the Zionist regime has been pushed by the hands of the children of Lebanon and Palestine…By G-d's will, we will witness the destruction of this regime in the near future."   - Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, June 3, 2007 [16]

 

 

 

 

 

 

A Common Antagonism Toward the West, Especially the U.S. and Europe

Both independently and in collaboration, Iran and Hezbollah have carried out major terror attacks against Israeli and Western targets over the past few decades.

IRAN

Iran, labeled by the U.S. State Department as a “state sponsor of terrorism,” bears responsibility for multiple acts of terror against the United States and Western countries. Iran also refuses to abide by United Nations Security Council Resolution 1696, which calls for it to halt its uranium enrichment program that could eventually be employed to develop nuclear weapons. [17]

• The Iranian Revolutionary Guard held 15 Royal Navy personnel hostage from March 23 - April 4, 2007, claiming the Royal Navy was trespassing in Iranian waters. According to GPS evidence, however, the Navy was in Iraqi territory. While in captivity, the soldiers were forced to appear on Iranian television and admit they were in the wrong. At the same time, Iranian students attacked the British embassy in Tehran. [18]
• Iran is responsible for the takeover of the American embassy in Iran in 1979 and the subsequent holding of 52 American hostages for 444 days. [19]

HEZBOLLAH [20]

Hezbollah, formally designated a  foreign terrorist organization by the U.S. State Department, is responsible for many past terrorist acts against Westerners. [21]

• In 1983, Hezbollah blew up a van in front of the U.S. Embassy and detonated truck bombs near U.S. Marine and French army barracks killing 357.
• Throughout the 1980s, Hezbollah kidnapped a number of Western citizens in executing some, and extorting the others for money or weapons. The group infamously hijacked an airplane in 1985, holding 39 American passengers for weeks.
• Hezbollah is responsible for two attacks in Argentina: the 1992 bombing of the Israeli Embassy and the 1994 bombing of the Jewish cultural center in Buenos Aires.
  

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Footnotes:

[1]  "Iranian complicity in the present Lebanese crisis - July-Aug. 2006," Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Aug. 15, 2006, http://www.mfa.gov.il/MFA/Terrorism-+Obstacle+to+Peace/Terror+Groups/Iranian+complicity+in+the+present+Lebanese+crisis+-+July-Aug+2006.htm.
 "Group Profile: Hezbollah," Memorial Institute for the Prevention of Terrorism, May 17, 2007, http://www.tkb.org/Group.jsp?groupID=3101.
[2] "Group Profile: Hezbollah," Memorial Institute for the Prevention of Terrorism, May 17, 2007, http://www.tkb.org/Group.jsp?groupID=3101.
[3] Haahr, Kathryn, "Iran's Changing Relationship with Hezbollah," Terrorism Monitor, Volume 2, Issue 19, Oct. 7, 2004, http://jamestown.org/terrorism/news/article.php?articleid=2368658.
[4] Erlich, Reuven, and Kahati, Yoram, "Hezbollah as a case study of the battle for hearts and minds," Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center at the Israel Intelligence Heritage & Commemoration Center (IICC) June, 2007 http://www.terrorism-info.org.il/malam_multimedia/English/eng_n/html/hezbollah_e_0607.htm.
[5] "Hezbollah as a strategic arm of Iran," Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center at the Center for Special Studies, Sept. 8, 2006, http://www.terrorism-info.org.il/malam_multimedia/English/eng_n/html/iran_hezbollah_e1b.htm.
[6]  "Hezbollah as a strategic arm of Iran," Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center at the Center for Special Studies, Sept. 8, 2006, http://www.terrorism-info.org.il/malam_multimedia/English/eng_n/html/iran_hezbollah_e1b.htm.
[7] "Hezbollah as a strategic arm of Iran," Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center at the Center for Special Studies, Sept. 8, 2006, http://www.terrorism-info.org.il/malam_multimedia/English/eng_n/html/iran_hezbollah_e1b.htm.
[8] "Hezbollah as a strategic arm of Iran," Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center at the Center for Special Studies, Sept. 8, 2006, http://www.terrorism-info.org.il/malam_multimedia/English/eng_n/html/iran_hezbollah_e1b.htm.
[9] "Hezbollah as a strategic arm of Iran," Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center at the Center for Special Studies, Sept. 8, 2006, http://www.terrorism-info.org.il/malam_multimedia/English/eng_n/html/iran_hezbollah_e1b.htm.
[10] "Iranian complicity in the present Lebanese crisis - July-Aug. 2006," Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Aug. 15, 2006, http://www.mfa.gov.il/MFA/Terrorism-+Obstacle+to+Peace/Terror+Groups/Iranian+complicity+in+the+present+Lebanese+crisis+-+July-Aug+2006.htm.
[11] Jorisch, Avi, "Al-Manar: Hizbullah TV, 24/7," The Middle East Quarterly, Volume XI: Number 1, Winter 2004, http://www.meforum.org/article/583.
[12]  "Hezbollah as a strategic arm of Iran," Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center at the Center for Special Studies, Sept. 8, 2006, http://www.terrorism-info.org.il/malam_multimedia/English/eng_n/html/iran_hezbollah_e1b.htm.
[13]  "Iranian complicity in the present Lebanese crisis - July-Aug. 2006," Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Aug. 15, 2006, http://www.mfa.gov.il/MFA/Terrorism-+Obstacle+to+Peace/Terror+Groups/Iranian+complicity+in+the+present+Lebanese+crisis+-+July-Aug+2006.htm.
[14] "The Abduction of Udi Goldwasser and Eldad Regev," Banim, http://www.banim.org/en/hatifa_udi_elad_en.html.
[15] "Hezbollah: Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah," Anti-Defamation League, Sept. 29, 2006, http://www.adl.org/main_terrorism/hezbollah_overview.htm?Multi_page_sections=sHeading_5.
[16] "Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in his Own Words," Anti-Defamation League, June 3, 2007, http://www.adl.org/main_Anti_Semitism_International/ahmadinejad_words.htm.
[17] "Resolution 1696," United Nations Department of Public Information, July 31, 2006, http://www.un.org/News/Press/docs/2006/sc8792.doc.htm.
[18] "Timeline: UK-Iran stand-off," BBC, Apr. 3, 2007, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/6502801.stm.
[19] "Background Note: Iran," Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs, United States Department of State, June 2007, http://www.state.gov/r/pa/ei/bgn/5314.htm.
[20] "Country Reports on Terrorism," Office of the Coordinator for Counterterrorism, United States Department of State, April 30, 2007, http://www.state.gov/s/ct/rls/crt/2006/82738.htm.
[21] "Group Profile: Hezbollah," Memorial Institute for the Prevention of Terrorism, May 17, 2007, http://www.tkb.org/Group.jsp?groupID=3101.