Nasrallah’s Half-Billion Dollars Found In His Beirut Bunker

Everyone knows that the Palestinian leaders, from the PLO’s Arafat to the Palestinian Authority’s Mahmoud Abbas, to the four men — Khaled Meshaal, Mousa Abu Marzouk, the late Ismail Haniyeh, and last but by no means least, the late Yahya Sinwar — who ran Hamas, have stolen billions of dollars from the people they claim to represent. The sums are not small. Arafat had accumulated a nest egg of from $1 billion to $3 billion. Mahmoud Abbas has, according to the most recent reports, $500 million. Khaled Meshaal has $4 billion; the late Ismail Haniyeh had $3 billion; Mousa Abu Marzouk has $4 billion; the late Yahya Sinwar had $3 billion. An impressive haul. Congratulations are due all around.

And also in the Grand Theft Sweepstakes, Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of Hezbollah in Lebanon, was no piker. Nasrallah had built a bunker under the Al-Sahel Hospital in Dahieh, in southern Beirut, in which he had stored both gold ingots and $500 million in cash. No doubt there were other sums he had stashed in other rat-holes, but $500 million in cash, and gold ingots whose value we do not yet know, in just one of his bunkers, is astonishing. “Hezbollah’s gold mine catches fire: Nasrallah’s bunker under hospital held half billion dollars,” by Gadi Zaig, Jerusalem Post, October 21, 2024:

IDF Spokesman Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari revealed on Monday night that the former Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah’s bunker in Dahieh in southern Beirut was located underneath a hospital – which held gold and half a billion dollars in cash.

One of his bunkers was located beneath the Al-Sahel Hospital and was used as Nasrallah’s emergency bunker, according to the IDF. The hospital has been evacuated following Israeli claims a Hezbollah cash bunker is located beneath it, hospital director Fadi Alameh told Reuters on Monday. Hagari said that Israel will not strike the hospital….

The IDF revealed a graphic photo and a video simulation of the structure. “This bunker is deliberately placed under the hospital and on both sides of it,” Hagari continued. “You can see the buildings under which the entrance shafts to the bunker are located.

“This money could and still can go to rebuilding the state of Lebanon. This money had been intended to go exclusively to arming the terrorist organization Hezbollah and had no other destination.”…

Note what the Israelis are not doing. They are not pocketing the money for themselves, which they could easily have done just by making no announcement at all. Or they could have said that they would be keeping the money to indemnify the 60,000 Israelis whom Hezbollah has prevented from returning to their homes in the north for the past year. But instead, the IDF spokesman, Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari, in announcing the colossal find, said that the money would be held in a kind of escrow, to be turned over to the Lebanese government once Hezbollah is defeated and unable to demand that the money be handed back — money which, after all, was stolen from the Lebanese people..

The Israelis have been busy devastating Hezbollah’ finances. First, the IDF has seized that $500 million in cash and an as-yet-unknown number of gold ingots that were in one of Nasrallah’s bunkers. Second, it has been systematically targeting Hezbollah officials in charge of the group’s finances, such as one senior money man who was just killed in Syria. Third, it has struck all 30 branches of the Al-Qard Al-Hasan bank, which handled all of Hezbollah’s finances, in so doing, has caused hundreds of millions of dollars to go up in smoke.

Hagari appealed to the people of Lebanon yet again: “our war is not against the citizens of Lebanon— but against a murderous regime which continues to arm itself and align itself with the interests of the Islamic Republic.” And he made clear that Nasrallah’s huge stash would be held by the IDF until it could be put to good use by the Lebanese: “This money could and still can go to rebuilding the state of Lebanon. This money had been intended to go exclusively to arming the terrorist organization Hezbollah and had no other destination.” How many Lebanese, hearing that, must have felt rage at Hezbollah and gratitude toward Israel?