The House Foreign Affairs Committee on Wednesday announced that it passed three bipartisan measures that target Hezbollah, the Iranian regime’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC)’s Lebanese Shia proxy.
“Hezbollah is Iran’s leading terrorist proxy, and it is only growing more dangerous,” Chairman Ed Royce (R-CA) said in a statement announcing the new pieces of legislation. “It now has an arsenal of more than 100,000 rockets aimed at Israel and has become battle-hardened while propping up the murderous Assad regime alongside the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps.”
He added, “With the House’s action today, we send a strong message that the United States will not allow this threat to go unchecked. These critical measures will impose new sanctions to crack down on Hezbollah’s financing, and hold it accountable for its acts of death and destruction.”
Royce noted in that “Hezbollah has taken hundreds of thousands of lives, including American lives” and included that the terrorist organization “now has an arsenal of more than 100,000 rockets aimed at Israel and has become battle-hardened while propping up the murderous Assad regime (in Syria) alongside the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).”
The three measures passed by the House are H.R. 3329, the Hizballah International Financing Prevention Amendments Act of 2017; H.R. 3342, the Sanctioning Hizballah’s Illicit Use of Civilians as Defenseless Shields Act; and H. Res. 359.
- HR 3329, authored by Chairman Royce will “sanction regimes that provide weapons to Hezbollah, target Hezbollah’s fundraising and recruiting efforts – including through innovative crowdsourcing techniques – and give the administration tools to respond to Hezbollah’s global criminal network.”
- H.R. 3342, authored by Rep. Mike Gallagher (R-WI), will “impose targeted sanctions on Iran and Hezbollah for the use of civilians as human shields.”
- H. Res. 359, authored by Rep. Ted Deutch (D-FL), “urges the European Union to designate Hezbollah in its entirety as a terrorist organization and increase pressure on it and its members.”
Algemeiner reported earlier on Wednesday that the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) revealed that “Hezbollah’s forces on Israel’s border in the Golan Heights were under the command of veteran terrorist Mounir Shaito.” An IDF spokesman said that Shaito was carrying out “Iran’s mission in the Golan.”
This month, this Breitbart News reporter put together “A Brief Timeline of Iran-Sponsored Terrorism Since 1979,” which included several examples of terrorist acts carried out by the terror proxy group against Americans and international civilians.
Adelle Nazarian is a politics and national security reporter for Breitbart News. Follow her on Facebook and Twitter.