Al-Qard al-Hassan, bombed by Israel over it is Hezbollah hyperlinks, is a lifeline for primarily Muslim Shiite communities battling a years-long monetary disaster that has locked Lebanese out of their financial institution deposits.
The monetary agency, formally registered as a charity, has been providing clients credit score in trade for gold deposits on an interest-free foundation for the reason that Nineteen Eighties.
Its beneficiaries are primarily Shiite Muslims, however in a rustic the place a five-year financial disaster has compelled many into desperation, Christians and Sunni Muslims have additionally turned to its providers.
The USA has sanctioned the affiliation, accusing Hezbollah of utilizing it as a canopy to masks its monetary actions and achieve entry to the worldwide monetary system.
On Sunday night, Israel struck Al-Qard al-Hassan branches in Beirut, the japanese Bekaa Valley and south Lebanon, official media mentioned.
Israel accuses Al-Qard al-Hassan of financing “Hezbollah’s terrorist operations”.
Al-Qard al-Hassan says it has greater than 30 branches nationwide, primarily in Hezbollah bastions together with Beirut’s southern suburbs, but in addition in central Beirut and in different main cities resembling Sidon and Tyre.
– Micro-credits –
It supplies micro-credits to small companies, staff and medium-sized agricultural or industrial enterprises.
Lately it has broadened its actions, even providing loans for photo voltaic panels, in a rustic affected by lengthy energy cuts.
In 2020 and 2021, whereas the financial crash prevented Lebanese banks from offering loans, Al-Qard al-Hassan mentioned it had granted 212,000 loans value $553 million “regardless of the disaster”.
The financial crash boosted the group’s attract past the Shiite neighborhood, as a result of it allowed depositors to protect their financial savings in gold.
Al-Qard al-Hassan says its loans can be found “to all Lebanese”, with some Christians and Sunnis additionally telling AFP they had been shoppers.
“You deposit gold, and so they offer you its value in money. You possibly can then repay (this mortgage) with out curiosity,” a buyer instructed AFP, talking on situation of anonymity out of safety considerations.
For Hezbollah scholar Amal Saad, Israel’s assaults on the monetary establishment aimed to shake the group’s help base.
“These strikes do not really goal Hezbollah’s funds or Iran’s funding, however the financial lifeline of over 300,000 Lebanese who not solely deposit their financial savings with the non-profit NGO but in addition depend on it for interest-free loans,” Saad mentioned on X.
“Whereas Iran helped set up the organisation within the Nineteen Eighties, it’s now completely self-funded, overwhelmingly by Lebanon’s Shia (Shiite) neighborhood” that represents 85 p.c of its shopper base, she mentioned.
A senior Israeli intelligence official, briefing journalists on situation of anonymity, additionally mentioned the strikes had been meant “to have an effect on the belief between Hezbollah and quite a lot of the Shiite neighborhood that makes use of this method”.
– ‘Escape supervision’ –
Saad added that Israel’s focusing on of Al-Qard al-Hassan is “a part of its technique to additional immiserate an already weak, displaced inhabitants,” she instructed AFP, referring to the assaults as “collective punishment” of Lebanese Shiites.
“It is also an expression of Israel’s chapter — it has did not make any significant incursions into South Lebanon… It is resorting to focusing on civilian establishments that are of no worth militarily,” she added.
Israel on September 30 started what it referred to as “focused” raids in opposition to Hezbollah in southern Lebanon, per week after it escalated air strikes.
Hezbollah critics say Al-Qard al-Hassan evaded laws that apply to the banking sector, since it’s formally registered with authorities as a charity.
Al-Qard al-Hassan has been caught up in decades-long tensions between Hezbollah’s Iranian patron and Washington.
In 2007, the US Treasury froze the establishment’s property, and in 2021 imposed new sanctions in opposition to a number of figures linked to it.
Al-Qard al-Hassan, “masquerades as a non-governmental group (NGO) below the quilt of a Ministry of Inside-granted NGO license, offering providers attribute of a financial institution in help of Hezbollah whereas evading correct licensing and regulatory supervision”, the US Treasury mentioned.
The division has additionally accused the group of “hoarding onerous forex” to construct Hezbollah’s “help base”.
Whereas it claims “to serve the Lebanese individuals, in follow it illicitly strikes funds by means of shell accounts and facilitators, exposing Lebanese monetary establishments to doable sanctions,” Treasury added.
