Another jihad charity. “Feds tie Dearborn charity to terror: Group accused of being a front for Hezbollah,” by Paul Egan for The Detroit News:
DEARBORN — The U.S. Treasury Department on Tuesday declared a Dearborn-based charity a front for the terrorist organization Hezbollah as FBI agents shut the group’s offices and carted away boxes of records.
FBI agents raided the offices of Goodwill Charitable Organization Inc. on West Warren Avenue near Schaefer Road. They also raided the nearby offices of the Al-Mabarrat Charitable Organization on Schaefer, though the Treasury Department did not designate Al-Mabarrat as a Hezbollah front, and the FBI allowed its offices to remain open.
Nobody was arrested or charged at either charity and area Muslim leaders urged the public not to rush to judgment.
The FBI in Detroit has used a strategy of fighting terrorism by attacking terrorists’ suspected funding sources and Tuesday’s move against Goodwill Charitable Organization is part of that effort.
In a 2005 filing with the Internal Revenue Service, the Goodwill Charitable Organization said it helps the poor, not specifying whether the help is given at home or abroad.
But the Treasury Department said the group — which has no connection with Goodwill Industries of Greater Detroit — is the Dearborn arm of the Iranian Martyrs Foundation, a group with offices in Lebanon and elsewhere that the U.S. government said funds the designated terrorist groups Hezbollah, Hamas and Islamic Jihad and aids Palestinian suicide bombers and their families.
Hezbollah and Hamas are active in Lebanon, while Islamic Jihad is based in Syria. All three are militant Islamic groups opposed to Israel with links to Iran.
Some area Arabs and Muslims consider Hezbollah and Hamas resistance fighters, not terrorists, though groups such as the Council on American Islamic Relations recognize the terrorist designations and urge Muslims not to support the groups.