On Monday, Israel targeted a building in Beirut’s southern suburbs, reportedly a branch of the Hezbollah-affiliated Al-Qard Al-Hassan financial institution, as part of an escalation in attacks against organizations linked to the Lebanese group. This move underscores the ongoing regional tensions and Israel's purported efforts to degrade Hezbollah's operational capabilities.
Al-Qard Al-Hassan is a quasi-banking institution that offers interest-free loans and is one of several charity organizations run by Hezbollah. Founded in 1983, it gained prominence after Lebanon's banking system collapsed in 2019, serving many unbanked individuals by providing microcredit and gold-backed loans without traditional banking fees. It operates outside the regulation of Lebanon's central bank and the international banking network.
Israel claims it is attempting to destroy Hezbollah's capacity to attack its northern territories, but human rights organizations, including Human Rights Watch, have condemned these strikes as "war crimes," arguing that financial institutions do not constitute lawful military targets under international law. A 2024 report highlighted that such attacks could disproportionately harm working-class Lebanese and those without access to formal banking, exacerbating the humanitarian crisis following Lebanon's 2019 financial collapse, which devalued the currency by over 90%.
Analysts, such as Lebanese political scientist Imad Salamey, suggest that Israel's strikes on Al-Qard Al-Hassan are largely symbolic and part of a broader campaign of political and psychological warfare against Hezbollah's institutional network. Salamey noted that many targeted sites are service branches with limited liquidity, implying minimal direct financial impact on Hezbollah, but the psychological and media effects aim to reinforce Israel's narrative of targeting infrastructure rather than civilians.
Concurrently, battles rage in southern Lebanon between Hezbollah fighters and Israeli troops, with Israel ordering mass evacuations from areas like Dahiyeh in Beirut's southern suburbs and south of the Litani River, displacing nearly 700,000 people. This escalation reflects deepening instability in the region, with critics arguing that the US-aligned Israeli regime's actions risk further civilian casualties and regional destabilization, despite its alleged security objectives.
Source: www.aljazeera.com