Islamists Fund Operations With Drug Money

If you are a supporter of any of those Islamic militant groups and think that they will always utilize just means in their struggles, then think it over.

Years of careful research and investigations revealed that, just like powerful cartels have made a fortune in the drug trade, now Islamic terrorist groups are following their examples to get the money to fund their operations.

For many, this might be not new. Aceh Freedom Movement, the former Islamic militant group who fought for Aceh freedom from Indonesia, funded their operations by selling and smuggling hashish to other provinces of the country, especially to the Republic’s capital of Jakarta.

The similar way has been taken by al-Qaeda, Hezbollah and other islamic terror groups with the help of Venezuelan strongman Hugo Chavez.

Investigations and research on intelligence data found that Venezuela under Hugo Chavez has become one of the major ports for drug trafficking across the whole world, especially to Europe and the United States.

The Trans-Atlantic Drug Trade

The transit point for cocaine bound for Europe is West Africa. Through the region, multi-billion dollar drug businesses have been flourished.

Drugs shipped from Venezuela will be guarded and escorted by al-Qaeda and Hezbollah to the final destination in Europe.

Roger Noriega, a former US Ambassador to the Organization of American States told the reporters that Venezuela President Hugo Chavez is well aware that drug shipments are flowing from his territory.

“Virtually every flight that goes to West Africa today that is bearing cocaine or other drugs, is coming from Venezuela,” he said.

“We have explicit evidence, and our government has sanctioned Venezuelan officials who have been involved in drug trafficking,” Noriega continued. “So we know that the regime is complicit for years, and that Chavez has to have knowledge and approve of this kind of trafficking”.

“This is a guy who claims to know every time a US Coast Guard cutter comes close to his country or flies close to his territory,” he added. “How can he claim to not be aware of 737s full of cocaine loading up in western Venezuela? He has to know about this kind of trafficking because it is so substantial”.

Noriega also told the reporters that Chavez has longstanding ties to Colombian drug traffickers, even before he became the president of Venezuela.

“It’s well established that even before he was president he had ties to the guerillas and these narco-traffickers,” he said. “And he has basically made Venezuelan territory readily available to them to transit cocaine and other drugs”.

‘Port’ Venezuela

Recent reports from both the United Nations and the US State Department revealed Venezuela has become a major trafficker to Europe and elsewhere.

“And it is not only going to West Africa,” Noriega said. “It is going up through the Caribbean and through the central American peninsula on its way to the United States. Chavez’s complicity in drug trafficking is a cheap way for him to wage asymmetrical warfare against his toughest opponents, including the United States”.

An African government official even admitted that thousands of drug shipments depart each year from northeastern Venezuela to West Africa through clandestine flights and/or fishing vessels.

“Once they arrive in West Africa,” he said, “the drugs are transported northward to their final destination of Europe”.

And Rudy Atallah, a former Africa counter-terrorism director for the US Department of Defense and currently the CEO of White Mountain Research said, “West Africa is the logical place in which they can bring their drugs to, break them up and then bring them into Europe”.
Atallah went on saying that Islamic terrorist groups are often waiting in the wings for the arrival of the drugs in Africa.

“Al Qaeda basically charges for the passage of the drugs through their territory,” he explained.
That territory – commonly known as the Islamic Maghreb – stretched from Morocco to Libya, down to Mali. It is also home to an al-Qaeda wing which is called al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb or AQIM.

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“There’s a synergy between the drug dealers and AQIM,” Atallah said. “Now, AQIM does not use the drugs. AQIM does not believe in the use of the drugs. But, it’s a way to make money”.
Having its funding sources cracked down all over the world, al-Qaeda turned to drugs to finance its operations.

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Recently, three al Qaeda agents from North Africa pleaded guilty to drug smuggling and terrorism charges in a US federal court. They also have admitted cooperating with Colombian drug traffickers.

“That access to money gives al Qaeda capabilities in the future to attack soft targets in Africa,” Atallah said. “And the soft targets could be U.S. embassies, Israeli embassies, French, UK embassies – all open targets in Africa. Also, targets in Europe”.

In its drug smuggling operation, al-Qaeda is following the example of its fellow Islamic terror group Hezbollah. Hezbollah has used drug money to fund its operations for years.

Atallah went on, “Hezbollah spread all across west Africa, starting from Senegal. They have a vast array of connections with the drug dealers. And so, it’s a natural flow where you have facilitations by Hezbollah in Africa to move drugs coming from Latin America to west Africa and up into Europe”.

But drug trade is only one of many income sources for Hezbollah in Africa.
“Hezbollah is involved in the diamond trade, they’re involved in gold, they’re involved in every smuggling business you can get your hands on,” Atallah added. “All the money that Hezbollah makes always goes to Lebanon, to southern Lebanon, to support war against Israel, to support their agenda”. (source: White Mountain)

Shimron Letters African Jihad Links

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