By Dr. Istvan Boross
Iran’s most prominent proxy organization is Hezbollah, primarily known for its operations in the Middle East. The group had direct ties to a recently killed intelligence chief of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, and on religious grounds, they have also subordinated themselves to the direction of the the late Iranian Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who was killed in a U.S.–Israeli strike in February 2026. Now that they have once again demonstrated their fighting spirit by launching rockets at Israel in recent days, it is worth examining another theater of their operations that has received less focus: their connection to Latin America.
The Triple Frontier
One of the defining characteristics of the Triple Border Area (TBA) between Argentina, Brazil, and Paraguay is its lawlessness. Due to the terrain, smuggling has flourished here for a long time; on foot or by boat, almost anything can be moved across the border without inspection. Compounding this is the presence of easily corruptible local officials and a Lebanese community of approximately 30,000 living around Ciudad del Este, which provided an ideal launching point for Hezbollah.
The group began establishing a presence in the region starting in the 1980s. Initially, their focus was solely on recruiting from the Lebanese diaspora, but they quickly identified other opportunities for fundraising. These included extortion, document and currency counterfeiting, and engaging in illicit trade. The terrain was perfect. Even in those early years, they were realizing an annual revenue of $20 million, from which they funneled millions back “home” for weapons purchases. Until 1992, they remained virtually unnoticed—or more accurately, they avoided drawing attention to themselves.
The Buenos Aires Attacks
This changed on March 17, 1992, when a car bomb attack targeted the Israeli embassy in Argentina, resulting in 29 deaths and 242 injuries. (1) This was followed by a bombing on July 18, 1994, against the Asociación Mutual Israelita Argentina (AMIA), a Jewish community center in Buenos Aires. The attack killed 85 people and injured over 300, an act for which an Argentine court later held Iran responsible. (2)
To this day, these attacks remain unsolved in Argentina. This impunity may explain why Argentina is the only Latin American country that has spoken positively about Trump’s war efforts against Iran. Notably, Argentina is also home to the region’s largest Jewish community (approximately 200,000 people), while the smallest, according to the 2022 census, is in Guyana, with a population of two. These attacks caught even the Israeli Security Service, Shin Bet, off guard; a week before the AMIA bombing, the head of Shin Bet had visited Buenos Aires and found everything to be in order. (3)
Following the two bombings, scrutiny of Hezbollah’s activities intensified. After the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center in 2001, official reports and studies multiplied, revealing details of the organization’s operations to the American public. (4) (5) While Hezbollah’s activities became evident by the mid-1990s, concrete evidence only emerged after the 9/11 attacks, when the U.S. began seriously assessing Islamist groups operating in its vicinity. In April 2002, Asa Hutchinson, then head of the DEA, testified before the U.S. House International Relations Committee, stating that the TBA provided sanctuary for Islamic terrorist organizations. (6)
A Criminal Enterprise
Today, it is clear that Hezbollah, in addition to receiving approximately $700 million annually from Iran, has built a significant economic infrastructure in Latin America. They focus heavily on counterfeiting (pharmaceuticals, clothing, passports, Paraguayan tax seals, and U.S. dollars) and also play a substantial role in collaborating with drug cartels. Their estimated annual income from these activities is between $300 and $500 million.
Beyond counterfeiting, they manufacture drugs (such as captagon), assist cartels with money laundering, and help map out drug trafficking routes. They are actively involved in operating the smuggling method known as “black cocaine.” Black cocaine is essentially regular cocaine mixed with charcoal powder, which masks the scent from detection dogs due to the activated carbon. This method was developed in the mid-1980s by the Chilean Pinochet dictatorship (specifically its intelligence agency, DINA) to conceal drug shipments bound for U.S. and European markets.
In addition to the TBA region, Hezbollah is active elsewhere in Latin America, including Venezuela, Mexico, and Bolivia.
Venezuela: A State Sponsor
In Venezuela, they collaborate with a criminal organization known as the Cartel of the Suns. Under Hugo Chávez, Venezuela opened its doors to Hezbollah, allowing the group to establish an active presence, including a paramilitary training camp on Margarita Island. (7) Tareck El Aissami, Venezuela’s former interior minister and head of ONIDEX (the Venezuelan Office of Identification, Immigration and Foreigners), played a key role in systematically providing Venezuelan passports to Lebanese, Syrian, and Iranian citizens linked to Hezbollah. (8) Between 2010 and 2019, the regime issued passports to more than 10,400 such individuals. CNN was banned from Venezuela following its report on this matter. (9)
The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) and Hezbollah have maintained a mutually beneficial criminal alliance since the 2000s, primarily in cocaine trafficking, money laundering, and arms trading. Their relationship is not ideological but a pragmatic business arrangement, often facilitated through Venezuela. The FARC shipped cocaine via Hezbollah’s networks to the Middle East, and in return, Iran supplied the FARC with rockets and other weapons.
Mexico and Bolivia: Cartel Connections
In Mexico, unlike in Venezuela, Hezbollah’s target was not the political class but the cartels, to whom they provided “back office” services indiscriminately. They managed shipments and raw material procurement in the Middle East, laundered money, and facilitated cartel operations through document forgery. Their most extensive partnership was/is with the Los Zetas cartel.
In Bolivia, which also has a strong Lebanese diaspora, authorities discovered 2.5 tons of explosive precursor material in a warehouse linked to Hezbollah in 2017. In the Santa Cruz de la Sierra area, families connected to the terrorist organization (such as the Barakat clan) launder money through commercial enterprises, including import/export businesses and real estate investments.
According to Michael Braun, a former DEA official, Hezbollah assists Mexican drug cartels with weapons trafficking, document forgery, and logistics, creating a seemingly perfect symbiosis: cartels gain access to forged visas and entry points to Middle Eastern drug distribution networks as suppliers, while Hezbollah gains access to drug money and, increasingly importantly, proximity to the U.S.-Mexico border. (10)
Current Situation and Future Implications
Saudi press reports from April 2025 indicated that approximately 400 Hezbollah operatives were ordered to leave Lebanon with their families for South America—including Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, and especially Venezuela—due to fears of becoming targets in Lebanon following the Lebanese government’s steps to dismantle the group. (7)
Furthermore, in light of the U.S.-Israeli military intervention that began days ago, it is crucial to maintain clarity: Hezbollah should be viewed not merely as a drug distributor, but as one of the largest and most influential terrorist organizations in the world. One of the three stated goals of the U.S.-Israeli military action against Iran is to compel Tehran to cease its support for terrorist groups, including Hezbollah. This will likely happen, making it a fundamental interest for Hezbollah to secure its operating funds from alternative sources.
One well-established method they possess is leveraging their influence in Latin America to strengthen revenues from illegal activities in collaboration with the cartels.
It is well known that U.S. federal agencies pay close attention to cartels. Consider Ecuador, where Trump recently took action, supplementing Ecuadorian law enforcement with U.S. military units to combat cartels. It would not bode well for U.S. national security if a terrorist organization, hitching itself to cocaine and fentanyl kingpins, were to consolidate its power along the southern border and begin more seriously contemplating attacks on American soil.
2. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/apr/12/argentina-iran-1994-amia-bombing
4.Nicholas Klerk https://dsc.duq.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1771&context=etd
5. https://www.nytimes.com/2001/09/27/world/terrorists-are-sought-in-latin-smugglers-haven.html
6. https://usinfo.org/wf-archive/2002/020424/epf312.htm
8. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-38986809
9. https://insightcrime.org/news/analysis/fact-checking-venezuelan-passports-terrorists-allegations/
10. https://www.aei.org/research-products/report/the-mounting-hezbollah-threat-in-latin-america/