How Real is the Threat of a Hezbollah Attack on Our Shores?

Wednesday, August 2, 2006

Fox News Interview

July 24, 2006

Transcript

Interviewer: Well Israeli embassies and Jewish institutions around the world have had to go on heightened alert. Israel’s security agency telling the Jerusalem Post, Hezbollah sleeper cells are operating outside of Lebanon and could be plotting global attacks. We already know that Hezbollah has agents here in the U.S., so how real is the threat of an attack? Tim Roemer is a former Indiana congressman, he served on the House permanent committee on intelligence. Congressman welcome.

Tim Roemer: Thank you.

Interviewer: What are your thoughts about the strength of Hezbollah and the possibility of an attack here on our shores?

Tim Roemer: Well, they have had brutal attacks globally in the past, and they have tried to focus regionally but have been effective around the world. We go back and look at Hezbollah back in the 1980s they were alleged to have been part of the TWA hijacking. In the 1990s, in Buenos Aires, they attacked both a Jewish organization and the Israeli embassy. And in the United States, certainly director Mueller has testified that Hezbollah has been effective and present in the United States in fundraising efforts. So they will have three goals: they will continue to try to be effective on the financial front, raising money in a post-9/11 world; politically they will use their efforts now in Lebanon and the Middle East to put these kinds of attacks in their propaganda films and continue to be relevant and recruit; and thirdly, militarily they’re finding out their capabilities with these rockets and these attacks on the Israelis and maybe use them someday for counterinsurgency efforts in southern Lebanon.

Interviewer: What are your thoughts today about Hassan Nasrallah the fact that when his headquarters were hit, his home was hit he immediately came out to let the world know that he was okay and offer that there would be surprises and no word since?

Tim Roemer: Well, we don’t know if the Israeli air strikes have been effective in getting him. We certainly know that the Israelis have assessed tactically and strategically what these air strikes have achieved to clear out the infrastructure of Hezbollah. I think that’s there overwhelming concern at this point—

Interviewer: Would it make a difference to take him out?

Tim Roemer: Oh, sure it would make a difference, just as it would be important for the United States to take out Osama bin Laden and Zawahiri. I was going to say that if you look back at some of bin Laden’s statements back in October of 2004, Osama bin Laden went back and said that the event that radicalized him was the Israeli and U.S. presence in Lebanon back in the early 1980s. So these terrorists groups, Hezbollah, Hamas, al-Qaeda use these kinds of efforts to recruit more, to raise money and to try to gain their visibility and relevance in this part of the world.

Interviewer: Congressman Roemer, thanks for weighing in.

Tim Roemer: Thank you again.

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