Hezbollah Operatives in the Bay Area

Part I of our expose by RadicalIslam.org’s investigative reporter detailed Hezbollah TV in the Bay Area. The following is Part II: Nabi Raza Mir is the mullah in charge of the Shia Association Bay Area (SABA) Mosque in San Jose, California. Mir was enough of a threat to Washington to try and keep him out of the US because of his Hezbollah connections (see Part I of this series).

However, Mir’s predecessor at the SABA mosque is a Shiite imam named Rafic Labboun, who was just released from prison after being convicted in 2010 for credit card and check fraud that may be linked to fundraising for Hezbollah.

Certain security sources have considered Labboun to be a high-level Hezbollah operative in the United States, even more dangerous than Mir, but as a naturalized US citizen it is difficult to prosecute or deport him as such.

The SABA Islamic Center is said to have several Iranian regime and Hezbollah agents who are in the US to report back on Iranian Lebanese expatriates to the mullah-led dictatorships back home. What is even more frightening are the Facebook pages of the Mosque’s young people, even those of Nabi Raza, Mir’s son, that are festooned with Hezbollah images and calls to kill "Zionists" and Sunni Muslims (considered by Iran as Allies of the United States.

How Labboun Landed in Prison

The story of how Labboun landed in US prison would give any religious congregation pause about hiring him again, not only to head one mosque, but all the regional ones of the same faith as well as a foreign language television station that reaches the entire Shiite community. Yet, he is being received with open arms by the congregants at SABA who rallied behind him during his trial.

Labboun left his position as imam in San Jose in 2002 and briefly returned in 2006 for two weeks ostensibly to devote his efforts toward building up the Khomeinist Shiite community in Northern California. (...)