CONCLUSIVE PROOF OF TERRORIST ACTS BY CAR-BOMB TARGET IS NOT EVIDENT

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000604900079-0
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 2
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: May 4, 2012
• Sequence Number: 79
• Publication Date: May 17, 1985
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/05/04: CIA-RDP90-00965R000604900079-0
ox YIG!_ F --
By David B. Ottawa
Waahington'Post-Staff-Water
The sheik who was the target of
Corii1~sive Proof of Terrorist Acts
By Car-Bomb Target Is Not Evident
6-
a car- om attack y a rou with
le- o the Central intelligence
Agency last Marc has re eate v
ben accuse of a ottin the bomb-
ing of the U.S. Marine headquarters
in Beirut in cto er 1983. But
,there has never been any conclu-
sive proo tat he really partici-
pate in p anniing and executing the
terrorist operation..
Some reports suggest he may
have provided the religious justifi-
cation for the action, even the final
blessings to the suicide driver of the
truck laden with ex-
plosives that drove
1 into the Marine com-
pound. But even these reports are
still the subject of dispute among
Middle East intelligence anaiysts.
[ uch o t e m ormation original-
ly imp catiog the sheik in that
bombing came originally rom
Christian-run intelligence services
that had their
wanting to implicate and assassi-
nate a man who had become their
eennire.
'Publicity in America about his
alleged role in the attack on U.S.
Marines, which left 241 American
servicemen dead, however, has
helped transform Mohammed Hus-
sein Fadlallah from a little-known
cleric in a southern suburb of Beirut
into a major spiritual leader of Shi-
ite Moslems whose books are now-,
read across the Arab world.
Had the March assassination at-
tempt succeeded, there is ? little
doubt it would have caused a major
backlash, with Shiite militants ev-
erywhere seeking to take revenge
against U.S. targets in Lebanon and
other Arab countries.
NEWS
ANALYSIS
WASHINGTON POST
17 May 1985
The whole episode raises ques-
tions not only about the use of for-
eign nationals to carry out antiter-
rorist activities, but also about the
sources the United States relies on
for information about terrorist
groups, particularly in Lebanon.
Ironically, the influential sheik
was recently asked to become an
intermediary in helping the United
States gain the-release of the kid-
naped Americans being held in Leb-
anon by an unknown Shiite militant
group. It is asking for the release of
17 Shiite extremists from prison iii
Kuwait in exchange for the Amer-
icans.
Almost from the day of the Oct.
23, 1983, bombing, the United
States and other western embassies
in Beirut began receiving reports
that the militant Shiite group Hez-
bollah, the Party of God, and its
alleged leader, Fadlallah, were be-
hind the operation.
"Washington wanted a name and
his started showing up in reports,"
remarked a U.S. diplomat formerly
stationed in Beirut. - mere was the
devil."
The original sources for all these
accusations, however, were t 7e
Lebanese army's ristian-run in-
telligence branch, known ase
G-2, and the right-wing ristian
Lebanese Forces militia's own in-
tellience service. The two have
had close ties for years and regu-
far exchange in ormation.
For the Christian militia and its
allies in the army's G-2 Fadlallah
was long the symbola burgeon-
ing, militant Shiism that sought the
creation of an Islamic republic in
Lebanon-which the Christians saw
as a threat to the existence of the
Christian population in the country.
Even before the bombing of the Ma-
rine headquarters, these ristian-
e into igence agencies had point-
ee to Fadla a as a leading pro
s
Tranian Shiite cleric. stirring up hi
community against the Christians.
The U.S. Embassy, which con-
ducted its own study of Shiite lead-
ers in southern Beirut prior to Oc-
tober 1983, then found little evi-
dence to support this alarmist por-
trayal of the sheik. Instead, it dis-
covered that Shiites generally re-
garded him as part of the "straight
establishment," which, as a member
of the Higher Islamic Council, he
was.
But Fadlallah's name had come
up before the Marine compound
bombing in connection with at least
one kidnaping operation. It was said
that Fadlallah had advance knowl-
edge of the incident.
Both U.S. and Israeli intelligence
ngled out a a a as a principa
organizer of the Marine barracks
bombing and other anti- estern
terrorism. but it was no secre o
reporters based in Beirut at t e
time that both intelligence services
were getting much of their in or-
mation from either the or
Christian m-M-5-a-in-t-effi-gence.
"They shared a of o informa-
tion," said a knowledgeable U.S.
military source with long experi-
ence in Lebanon.
According to the U.S. diplomat
who formerly served in Beirut,
"The stuff on the Marine barracks
was very iffy and all G-2."
Later, other U.S. intelligence
reports, said to be independent o
the G-2 or the Christian militia in-
telligence service, reportedly also
inked ac al ah to the 1983 bomb-
i The reports said he had partic-
ipated in a meeting in Damascus
three days before with suspected
terrorist operatives. His role at
those meetings remains obscure,
however. The source of these later
Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/05/04: CIA-RDP90-00965R000604900079-0
 Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/05/04: CIA-RDP90-00965R000604900079-0
independent U.S. intelligence re-
ports is unclear.
The United States used to gather
some of its most valuable informa-
tion about Moslem activities in
West Beirut from Palestinians,
sometimes from members of . the
Palestine Liberation Organization
itself. But with the ouster of the
PLO from Beirut in late August
1982, these sources dried up, cre-
ating an intelligence gap for t e
UIA in Lebanon and a growing e-
pendency for information on the
an other Christian sources.
Sheik Fadlallah's role in organi-
zing, or blessing, anti-Western ter-
rorist activities in Lebanon remains
subject to much debate and little
precise information to this day. In
appearance and word, the sheik
comes across as an erudite scholar,
which he, undisputably is, rather
than a terrorist operator.
Furthermore, he has openly spo-
ken out at times against both sui-
cide bombings and hijackings, which
he called "un-Islamic," and several
times urged the Shiites living in the
southern Beirut suburbs not to seek
revenge on westerners.
In November 1983, during a par-
ticularly tense moment immediately
after a French air raid on militant
Shiite camps in eastern Lebanon.
the sheik publiciy called on his fol-
lowers not to seek revenge.
Perhaps the closest direct link
established between Fadlallah and
the Marine compound bombing was
his relationship with Hussein
Musawi, a follower of the sheik who
led the extremist group Islamic
Amal and helped set up the militant
Hezbollah, according to a Washing-
ton Post investigation of the bomb-
ing incident early last year.
. However, a Beirut-based Amer-
ican reporter for the Sunday Times
of London, Robin Wright, who has
just finished. a book on Shiite ex-
tremism, said she had been unable
to find evidence of a 'direct connec-
tion between Fadlallah and any of
the bombings, or with Hezbollah.
"Every source I spoke to, includ-
ing some of the most militant Shi-
ites, claimed that he had no direct
links to any of the [extremist]
groups," she said in an interview.
Rather, Fadlallah has become a
spiritual leader to Shiites in various
groups, "like Ayatollah Khomeini."
Lebanese sources said Fadlallah
now ranks among the highest re-
ligious authorities in contemporary
Shiism, an offshoot of the main
Sunni school of Islam. This is a
sharp contrast to his reputation be-
fore the bombing of the Marine bar-
racks in 1983. Then, the sheik was
hardly known outside his own squal-
id quarters in the southern Beirut
suburb of Bir Abed.
a.
Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/05/04: CIA-RDP90-00965R000604900079-0