EU pressured to blacklist Hezbollah in wake of Bulgaria bus attack report
While Bulgaria has fingered Hezbollah in a deadly 2012 attack on Israeli tourists, some EU members remain reluctant to label Hezbollah a terrorist organization.
While Bulgaria has fingered Hezbollah in a deadly 2012 attack on Israeli tourists, some EU members remain reluctant to label Hezbollah a terrorist organization.
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European Union leaders are under renewed pressure to list Hezbollah as a terrorist organization after Bulgaria released a report implicating the Lebanese militant group in the July 2012 bombing of a bus carrying Israeli tourists in the Bulgarian town of Burgas.
But while the reclassification might seem likely after such an incident, some EU members remain reluctant to formalize the terrorist designation.
Blacklisting Hezbollah would pave the way to blocking cash flow to the militant organization from member states and freezing European assets linked to the group, according to The Wall Street Journal. The US and Israel, both of whom already classify the group as a terrorist organization, have been pushing the EU to take the step for years.
Naim Qassem, Hezbollah鈥檚 deputy leader, denied responsibility and blamed the Bulgarian report on an Israeli campaign 鈥渢o intimidate people and countries against Hezbollah,鈥� the Wall Street Journal reports.
But the perception among some Israelis is that even this incident is unlikely to be enough to overcome EU resistance to blacklisting the group. In an analysis for The Jerusalem Post, diplomatic correspondent Herb Keinon writes:
A number of factors explain European leaders' reticence to take that step, Mr. Keinon writes. France might lose its leverage inside Lebanon, where Hezbollah is the leading government player. Hezbollah might be forced to leave the government, which would destabilize ever-fragile Lebanon during a volatile time for the whole region. And it could raise the chances of retaliation on European nationals.
The EU has several options other than blacklisting Hezbollah, the Wall Street Journal notes.
The UK and the Netherlands already consider Hezbollah a terrorist organization, although the UK only blacklists the group鈥檚 military wing.
Thanassis Cambanis, a journalist who has written a book on Hezbollah, writes in The Atlantic that the Burgas bombing bolsters speculation that Hezbollah is less concerned about styling itself as something other than a terrorist group 鈥� a strategy that, until now, has helped it聽stay on the right side of the law with the EU.
The Wall Street Journal writes that the issue is unlikely to be addressed at a previously scheduled EU meeting tomorrow, but that it will "almost certainly" be on the agenda at a meeting later this month.