Seventeen years ago this week, Hezbollah operatives working closely with Iranian
intelligence blew up the Israeli-Argentine Mutual Association (AMIA) building in
Buenos Aires, killing 85 people and wounding 300 more. Now, after years of
obstructing investigation into the attack, Iran claims it is ready to “engage in
constructive dialogue” with Argentina about the case, but insists that talk of
an Iranian link is nothing more than “plots and political games.”
In
fact, it is Iran that is playing games.
Argentinean authorities conducted
an extensive investigation into the AMIA attack, with significant international
cooperation, and concluded that “the decision to carry out the AMIA attack was
made, and the attack was orchestrated, by the highest officials of the Islamic
Republic of Iran at the time, and that these officials instructed Lebanese
Hezbollah – a group that has historically been subordinated to the economic and
political interests of the Tehran regime – to carry out the attack.”
Iran
and Hezbollah each had their own reasons for wanting to attack Israeli or Jewish
targets in Argentina in 1994, as they had just two years earlier when they
bombed the Israeli embassy in Buenos Aires. At the time, Tehran was furious over
Buenos Aires’ decision to cease all nuclear cooperation with Iran in 1992 for
fear that Iran’s nuclear program was not limited to peaceful purposes. In 1994,
Argentina terminated its nuclear cooperation. Hezbollah, meanwhile, sought to
avenge the Israeli assassination of its leader, Abbas Moussawi, in 1992, and
then Israel’s capture of Hezbollah ally Mustapha Dirani in Southern Lebanon in
May 1994. Such coincidence of interests, coupled with Hezbollah’s prized status
as Tehran’s primary proxy, and operational considerations such as Argentina’s
porous borders, Iran’s heavy diplomatic and intelligence presence there, and the
existence of a strong Hezbollah financial/logistical support network in South
America, all combined to make Argentina a particularly attractive target for
Iranian intelligence and Hezbollah operatives.
ACCORDING TO Argentinean
intelligence, as early as May 1993 – a full year before Dirani’s capture by
Israeli commandos – and again in November 1993, Iranian operative Mohsen Rabbani
visited Buenos Aires car dealerships inquiring about purchasing a Renault Trafic
van of the kind later used in the 1994 AMIA bombing. Rabbani’s fieldwork in
support of Iranian intelligence dates to his arrival in Argentina in 1983, when
he began recruiting local Shia – described by others in the community as his
“antennas” – who served as an informal intelligence network, carrying out
surveillance on his instructions. Assessments from Rabbani’s scouts on potential
Jewish and American targets in the city served as the basis for targeting
reports that Rabbani drafted and passed along to senior intelligence officials
in Iran. Rabbani was the imam at the al- Tawhid mosque, which served as a base
for his activities on behalf of Iran, and was also intimately involved in
staffing Iranian front companies in Argentina. According to prosecutors,
Rabbani’s surveillance reports would later prove to be “a determining factor in
making the decision to carry out the AMIA attack.”
Based on evidence
gathered in the AMIA investigation, including the testimony of Abolghasem
Mesbahi, a defector from the Iranian Ministry of Intelligence and Security
(MOIS), prosecutors concluded that the decision to bomb the AMIA building was
made at a meeting held by Iran’s Supreme National Security Council in Mashhad on
Saturday, August 14, 1993.
During this meeting, senior Iranian leaders
approved the bombing plot and selected the AMIA building as the
target.
According to Argentinean intelligence, once the committee reached
its decision, intelligence chief Ali Fallahian was given overall operational
responsibility for the attack, and Qods Force Commander Ahmad Vahidi – who today
serves as Iran’s Minister of Defense and is a wanted fugitive in Argentina – was
instructed to provide any necessary assistance. Fallahian turned to Hezbollah’s
Imad Mughniyeh to execute the attack. Rabbani was put in charge of local
logistics, including all details pertaining to the purchase, hiding and arming
of the van to be used in the bombing. Rabbani was also suddenly appointed
Cultural Attaché at the Iranian embassy, providing him with diplomatic immunity.
Asghari, already a diplomat, was tasked with activating Iran’s “clandestine
networks” in support of the operation.
In time, investigators would
uncover records of phone calls between the Iranian embassy in Buenos Aires and
suspected Hezbollah operatives in the tri-border area who helped coordinate the
attack out of a mosque and a travel agency there.
ARGENTINA’S FOREIGN
ministry issued a statement saying it had yet to receive a formal word from
Tehran but, if confirmed, Iran’s offer to cooperate with the AMIA investigation
would be “unprecedented and positive.”
Iran’s offer should be immediately
tested with renewed requests for those indicted to be made available to stand
trial. But the families of the victims should not hold their breath waiting for
Iran’s response. In light of the evidence linking Iran and Hezbollah to the AMIA
bombing, the odds are overwhelming that Iran’s offer to assist in the
investigation is, to borrow Iran’s phrase, nothing more than “plots and
political games.”
The writer directs the Stein Program on
Counterterrorism and Intelligence at The Washington Institute for Near East
Policy, and is the author of the forthcoming book Hezbollah: The Global
Footprint of Lebanon’s ‘Party of God.’