Why the CIA Killed Imad Mughniyeh

(Politico) Matthew Levitt - Last week the Washington Post reported on the CIA's role in the February 2008 assassination of Hizbullah master terrorist Imad Mughniyeh, a man responsible for the deaths of more Americans than anyone else until 9/11. Most people - including Hizbullah - assumed it was the Israelis, acting alone, who killed Mughniyeh, given his role in acts of terror targeting Israelis and Jews around the world. But the CIA had motive too. Mughniyeh was behind the 1983 bombing of the U.S. embassy in Beirut, which took out the entire CIA station there as well as the visiting head of the agency's Middle East analysis branch. William Buckley, who was sent to Beirut in 1983 to set up a new CIA station, was kidnapped in March 1984, likely supported by Iranian intelligence, and eventually murdered. Mughniyeh also reportedly planned the 1984 bombing of the U.S. Marine barracks and watched the attack unfold through binoculars from the top of a nearby building. The writer is Director of the Stein Program on Counterterrorism and Intelligence at The Washington Institute for Near East Policy.


2015-02-10 00:00:00

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