On MSNBC's “The Chris Jansing Report,” which aired Monday, NBC News foreign correspondent Matt Bradley said Israel has made Lebanese banks “contribute significantly to charitable donations and provide loans to ordinary people.” “We have also targeted Shiite Muslim banks in particular.” “Most are Hezbollah supporters,” he said, adding that “the United States placed the bank under sanctions throughout the 2000s.”
“So these were basically targeting banks,” Bradley said. “They made significant contributions to charity and targeted the public, particularly Shiite Muslims, primarily supporters of Hezbollah.” They were targeting Islamic financial institutions that provide loans to people who are not necessarily Shiite Muslims or even any Muslim sect, especially here in Lebanon. After the Lebanese financial crisis in 2019, people actually started going to these banks. And they lend to people on Islamic terms, which essentially means no interest.”
He continued, “But the Israelis claim that this was a front used by the Iranians to fund Hezbollah through Iran. Now, Iran has provided Hezbollah with really lavish funding. It is no secret that Hezbollah owes a great deal of loyalty to the Iranians. But whether this particular bank plays a significant role or not, the Israelis do. It seems like the US put this bank under sanctions all the way back in the 2000s, but these attacks, the fact that they're targeting these banks now, and what they've done before. The fact that they're not just targeting (beheading Hezbollah senior leaders), a few weeks ago they attacked a medical unit, or something like a hospital in downtown Beirut… They , now they are actually showing they are expanding their targeting beyond just Hezbollah's leadership, its rank-and-file soldiers, and military targets such as missile silos and other military facilities across the country. I'm aiming for
Bradley concluded: “This shows that the Israelis are not going to leave no stone unturned this time when it comes to defeating Hezbollah. This cliché goes: You really want to avoid making the same mistakes you made in the past. Cutting off a snake's head won't make it so. [not] It will grow again. Well, now it looks like the Israelis are going to kill the whole snake. They don't just want to decapitate the Hezbollah leadership. They are actually trying to completely destroy and even dismantle this group by cutting off the medical and financial institutions that many people here in Lebanon depend on. ”
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