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Iran Is Connected to Failed Hezbollah Attacks in Latin America
The flags of Hezbollah and Iran. Photo: File.
Operation Trapiche — a plot to kill Jews in Brazil — revealed the shadow of Iran behind the failed Hezbollah plot. According to Brazilian Federal Police documents exclusively obtained by the Investigative Project on Terrorism (IPT), the two masterminds wanted by Interpol, Mohamad Khir Abdulmajid, a naturalized Syrian-Brazilian, and Haissam Houssim Diab, a Lebanese national, had strong connections to the Islamic Beneficent Cultural Center of Brasilia (CCBIB). This Shiite center has been funded by Iran since 2019.
Last November, IPT reported on Operation Trapiche. When the plot was broken up, it exposed a Brazilian network with suspected links to the Lebanese terrorist group Hezbollah. Abdulmajid and Diab lured at least six Brazilians to Beirut, where they offered them large sums of money to carry out a series of major terror attacks against multiple Jewish and Israeli targets throughout Brazil.
The Brazilian Federal Police documents reveal Mohamad Khir Abdulmajid as the primary promoter of establishing the Shia Islamic Center of Brasilia in 2019. Additionally, the center’s board members include Hicham Hussein Diab, the brother of Haissam Houssim Diab, the other mastermind uncovered by Operation Trapiche.
According to the Brazilian police report, “it is noteworthy that Abdulmajid, believed to be one of the main backers of the Islamic Center’s establishment, is not listed in the corporate structure of the center, despite the overwhelming evidence suggesting his involvement.”
Abdulmajid’s decision to remain behind the scenes may be part of a strategy. The police report notes that Abdulmajid’s WhatsApp communications cite a project drawn up by Sheikh Mohammed Sadeq Maadel, also known as Moaddel Ebrahimi, as a model for the bylaws of the new center. In a photo posted on Abdulmajid’s social networks in 2018, he is pictured at the Syrian embassy in Brasilia with Ebrahimi.
Ebrahimi, a Sheikh originally from Iraq, now based at Shia Brás mosque in São Paulo, has long been Bilal Mohsen Wehbe’s right-hand man in Latin America. According to the US Treasury Department’s designation in 2010, Wehbe was “Hezbollah’s chief representative in South America responsible for oversight of the group’s counterintelligence activities in the Tri-Border area” — made up of Argentina, Brazil, and Paraguay.
A recent report titled “Hezbollah Terror Plot in Brazil,” published by the International Institute for Counter-Terrorism at Reichman University, suggests that “it is possible that Sheikh Ebrahimi, who worked with Wehbe, is part of Hezbollah’s clerical nomenclature and maybe the new Foreign Relations Department (FRD), person in Brazil. If so, his connections to both Haissam Diab and Mohamed Abdulmajid would not just be that of a pastoral guide to his spiritual flock but possibly more — that of a handler.” Hezbollah’s Foreign Relations Department serves as a link between Tehran and the global Shia communities.
Rising Antisemitism Provides Cover for Hezbollah terror
The reason for Hezbollah’s change in tactics may have to do with the ongoing Gaza war. Hezbollah may want to use Brazil and Latin America as a proxy battleground to provoke Israel without facing severe consequences. Given the surge in antisemitic events worldwide, a successful assault by unidentified Brazilians may have been passed off as a hate crime orchestrated by radical locals, and not a terrorist attack.
Hate speech and antisemitic incidents in Brazil have increased by 236. This may be related to statements by President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, according to the Israel Federation of the State of São Paulo. (FISESP). Lula has repeatedly accused Israel of committing “genocide” against Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.
Recently, Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz declared the Brazilian president persona non grata over his comparison of Israel’s war against Hamas to the Holocaust. ”
Recruiting Locally to Strengthen Hezbollah in Brazil
Against this political backdrop, Operation Trapiche also confirmed the strengthening of Hezbollah in Brazil. For several years the group has used local networks to establish illicit finance networks and support terror attacks.
Haissam Houssim Diab and Mohamad Khir Abdulmajid were small business owners in the local Shia diaspora. They were also relatives, as Abdulmajid’s mother is a Lebanese national from the Diab family, and they spent a significant amount of time at the TBA. However, they could not afford the money they had allegedly promised their recruits, leading police to wonder where they had obtained the funding.
According to investigations, by recruiting locals, Hezbollah External Security Organization (ESO) — which is in charge of international terror attacks — funded the plot in Brazil through its subsidiary, the Hezbollah Business Affairs Component (BAC). BAC oversees drug trafficking and money laundering operations to fund terrorist activities, procure weapons, and support terrorist families.
Hezbollah’s Criminal Operations
Haissam Houssim Diab may be involved in the BAC, as he has been linked to Lebanese drug trafficker Akram Abed Ali Kachmar. During a police raid in 2017, Kachmar’s home in Ciudad Del Este, Paraguay, was searched while the two were together. Diab was briefly detained but not charged. Authorities also discovered Kachmar’s ties to a powerful drug trafficking network of Lebanese origin based in Paraguay, led by Hezbollah financier Ali Issa Chamas. In 2017 Chamas was sentenced to 42 months in prison in Miami for conspiring to distribute massive amounts of cocaine to the United States. He is currently serving another sentence in Paraguay for international drug trafficking.
Diab’s phone connections led to several money exchange businesses, including the Chams Exchange. The US Department of the Treasury sanctioned the exchange in 2019 due to its involvement in narcotics money laundering activities between Australia, Colombia, Italy, Lebanon, the Netherlands, Spain, Venezuela, France, Brazil, and the United States. Additionally, Diab has contact with Sobhi Fayad, a Hezbollah financier based in TBA, who was sanctioned by the Treasury Department in 2006.
Last week ,Brazil’s Federal Prosecutor’s Office approved a complaint against Lucas Passos Lima, the primary investigator, for surveillance videos of potential Jewish targets. The trial is set to begin on March 21, while Diab and Abdulmajid are believed to be eluding authorities in Lebanon. Despite facing charges related to Operation Trapiche, it is unlikely that they will be found guilty under Brazilian anti-terrorism legislation. This is the likely result because only five out of the 33 countries in Latin America and the Caribbean have officially designated Hezbollah as a terrorist group, with Brazil not being one of them.
This legal vacuum, combined with Lula’s anti-Israel stance, could pose fresh threats, not just in Brazil, but across Latin America in the months ahead.
Maria Zuppello is an Italian analyst based in Brazil and an expert on the crime-terror nexus. In her book, Tropical Jihad. she explores the connections between Hezbollah, Latin American cartels, and the Italian ‘Ndrangheta mafia. (The ‘Ndrangheta is the Calabrian mafia, considered one of the most powerful mafia families in the world today.) Maria tweets at @mzuppy A version of this article was originally published by The Investigative Project on Terrorism.
The post Iran Is Connected to Failed Hezbollah Attacks in Latin America first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Security Warning to Israelis Vacationing Abroad Ahead of holidays
A passenger arrives to a terminal at Ben Gurion international airport before Israel bans international flights, January 25, 2021. REUTERS/Ronen Zvulun
i24 News – Ahead of the Jewish High Holidays, Israel’s National Security Council (NSC) published the latest threat assessment to Israelis abroad from terrorist groups to the public on Sunday, in order to increase the Israeli public’s awareness of the existing terrorist threats around the world and encourage individuals to take preventive action accordingly.
The NSC specified that the warning is an up-to-date reflection of the main trends in the activities of terrorist groups around the world and their impact on the level of threat posed to Israelis abroad during these times, but the travel warnings and restrictions themselves are not new.
“As the Gaza war continues and in parallel with the increasing threat of terrorism, the National Security Headquarters stated it has recognized a trend of worsening and increasing violent antisemitic incidents and escalating steps by anti-Israel groups, to the point of physically harming Israelis and Jews abroad. This is in light of, among other things, the anti-Israel narrative and the negative media campaign by pro-Palestinian elements — a trend that may encourage and motivate extremist elements to carry out terrorist activities against Israelis or Jews abroad,” the statement read.
“Therefore, the National Security Bureau is reinforcing its recommendation to the Israeli public to act with responsibility during this time when traveling abroad, to check the status of the National Security Bureau’s travel warnings (before purchasing tickets to the destination,) and to act in accordance with the travel warning recommendations and the level of risk in the country they are visiting,” it listed, adding that, as illustrated in the past year, these warnings are well-founded and reflect a tangible and valid threat potential.
The statement also emphasized the risk of sharing content on social media networks indicating current or past service in the Israeli security forces, as these posts increase the risk of being marked by various parties as a target. “Therefore, the National Security Council recommends that you do not upload to social networks, in any way, content that indicates service in the security forces, operational activity, or similar content, as well as real-time locations.”
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Israel Intensifies Gaza City Bombing as Rubio Arrives
Displaced Palestinians, fleeing northern Gaza due to an Israeli military operation, move southward after Israeli forces ordered residents of Gaza City to evacuate to the south, in the central Gaza Strip September 14, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Mahmoud Issa
Israeli forces destroyed at least 30 residential buildings in Gaza City and forced thousands of people from their homes, Palestinian officials said, as US Secretary of State Marco Rubio arrived on Sunday to discuss the future of the conflict.
Israel has said it plans to seize the city, where about a million Palestinians have been sheltering, as part of its declared aim of eliminating the terrorist group Hamas, and has intensified attacks on what it has called Hamas’ last bastion.
The group’s political leadership, which has engaged in on-and-off negotiations on a possible ceasefire and hostage release deal, was targeted by Israel in an airstrike in Doha on Tuesday in an attack that drew widespread condemnation.
Qatar will host an emergency Arab-Islamic summit on Monday to discuss the next moves. Rubio said Washington wanted to talk about how to free the 48 hostages – of whom 20 are believed to be still alive – still held by Hamas in Gaza and rebuild the coastal strip.
“What’s happened, has happened,” he said. “We’re gonna meet with them (the Israeli leadership). We’re gonna talk about what the future holds,” Rubio said before heading to Israel where he will stay until Tuesday.
ABRAHAM ACCORDS AT RISK
He was expected to visit the Western Wall Jewish prayer site in Jerusalem on Sunday with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and hold talks with him during the visit.
US officials described Tuesday’s strike on the territory of a close US ally as a unilateral escalation that did not serve American or Israeli interests. Rubio and US President Donald Trump both met Qatar’s Prime Minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al-Thani on Friday.
Netanyahu signed an agreement on Thursday to push ahead with a settlement expansion plan that would cut across West Bank land that the Palestinians seek for a state – a move the United Arab Emirates warned would undermine the US-brokered Abraham accords that normalized UAE relations with Israel.
Israel, which blocked all food from entering Gaza for 11 weeks earlier this year, has been allowing more aid into the enclave since late July to prevent further food shortages, though the United Nations says far more is needed.
It says it wants civilians to leave Gaza City before it sends more ground forces in. Tens of thousands of people are estimated to have left but hundreds of thousands remain in the area. Hamas has called on people not to leave.
Israeli army forces have been operating inside at least four eastern suburbs for weeks, turning most of at least three of them into wastelands. It is closing in on the center and the western areas of the territory, where most of the displaced people are taking shelter.
Many are reluctant to leave, saying there is not enough space or safety in the south, where Israel has told them to go to what it has designated as a humanitarian zone.
Some say they cannot afford to leave while others say they were hoping the Arab leaders meeting on Monday in Qatar would pressure Israel to scrap its planned offensive.
“The bombardment intensified everywhere and we took down the tents, more than twenty families, we do not know where to go,” said Musbah Al-Kafarna, displaced in Gaza City.
Israel said it had completed five waves of air strikes on Gaza City over the past week, targeting more than 500 sites, including Hamas reconnaissance and sniper sites, buildings containing tunnel openings and weapons depots.
Local officials, who do not distinguish between militant and civilian casualties, say at least 40 people were killed by Israeli fire across the enclave, a least 28 in Gaza City alone.
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Turkey Warns of Escalation as Israel Expands Strikes Beyond Gaza
Turkey’s President Tayyip Erdogan speaks during a press conference with Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis (not seen) at the Presidential Palace in Ankara, Turkey, May 13, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Umit Bektas
i24 News – An Israeli strike targeting Hamas officials in Qatar has sparked unease among several Middle Eastern countries that host leaders of the group, with Turkey among the most alarmed.
Officials in Ankara are increasingly worried about how far Israel might go in pursuing those it holds responsible for the October 7 attacks.
Israel’s prime minister effectively acknowledged that the Qatar operation failed to eliminate the Hamas leadership, while stressing the broader point the strike was meant to make: “They enjoy no immunity,” the government said.
On X, Prime Minister Netanyahu went further, writing that “the elimination of Hamas leaders would put an end to the war.”
A senior Turkish official, speaking on condition of anonymity, summed up Ankara’s reaction: “The attack in Qatar showed that the Israeli government is ready to do anything.”
Legally and diplomatically, Turkey occupies a delicate position. As a NATO member, any military operation or targeted killing on its soil could inflame tensions within the alliance and challenge mutual security commitments.
Analysts caution, however, that Israel could opt for covert measures, operations carried out without public acknowledgement, a prospect that has increased anxiety in governments across the region.
Israeli officials remain defiant. In an interview with Ynet, Minister Ze’ev Elkin said: “As long as we have not stopped them, we will pursue them everywhere in the world and settle our accounts with them.” The episode underscores growing fears that efforts to hunt Hamas figures beyond Gaza could widen regional friction and complicate diplomatic relationships.