Faint Heart, Brutal Butchers

"The Burgas bombers were maintaining part of Hezbollah's structures in Canada and Australia and had contacts with representatives of this organization. Our hypothesis is that the two were fellow engineering students in Lebanon where they were planning the terror attack."
Tsvetan Tsvetanov, Bulgarian Interior Minister

"We believe there is overwhelming evidence to suggest Hezbollah has been not just complicit, but actively carrying out terrorist attacks around the world in support of Iran. We hope that the European Union will follow Canada's Lead.
"We continue to urge the European Union and all partners who have not already done so to list Hezbollah as a terrorist entity and prosecute terrorist acts committed by this reckless and inhumane organization to the fullest possible extent.
"The depravity of Hezbollah knows no bounds, and Canada will continue to work with allies and partners to ensure that Hezbollah and its backers are held to account, and justice prevails."
Rick Roth, spokesman, Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird

Of the European Union member countries only the Netherlands lists Hezbollah as a terror group; Britain lists the jihadist wing of Iran's proxy terror militia only as a terror group, making a distinction between it and the political wing. And there is a response to that; how can one distinguish between activities of an organization like Hezbollah to name a 'wing' respectable, but another representing a terrorist group.

That specious logic should have been put to rest in 2009 when Hezbollah's Naim Qassem objected to the British separation into political-social charitable and military wings, informing the Los Angeles Times: "The same leadership that directs the parliamentary and government work (in Lebanon) also leads jihad actions in the struggle against Israel."

France and Germany can be considered leaders within the EU. Both also lead the way in fearing that identifying Hezbollah as a terrorist group could lead to retribution. Hezbollah has infiltrated its way into Western society in Europe and in North America; it has a presence wherever it wants to have one, wherever it is expedient for them to recruit new members to dedicate themselves to the cause that Iran insists all must share.

The Europeans - according to Matthew Levitt, Director of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy's counter terrorism and intelligence program - fear stirring up the terror group. "Hezbollah is not very active in Europe and the Europeans feel that if you poke Hezbollah or Iran in the eye, they will do the same to you. If you leave them alone, then maybe they will leave you alone."

Hezbollah is busy on the criminal scene in Europe and North American, complicit in drug trafficking and earning huge sums of money enabling them to buy advanced weapons on the black market, which Iran is unable now to fund them to do, since the UN and US-backed sanctions have eaten into the Republic's oil income, and they divert all available funding to their nuclear program shared with North Korea.

In Europe, its cells draw no attention to themselves, preferring quiet activities related mostly to fund-raising to enable their agenda. But this A-team of terror had been involved before 9/11 in murdering Americans, succeeding in killing more than any other terror group. In conjunction with Iran it has perpetrated attacks in Argentina, Britain, India, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Greece, Kenya, Cyprus, Israel, Thailand, Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Lebanon.

Urging the European Union and its member countries to "send a strong message", in blacklisting the Lebanese Shiite terror group seems reasonable enough, given their undeniable history and ongoing mandate. Canada outlawed Hezbollah in 2002. The European Union is resisting pressure to declare Hezbollah a terrorist group after Bulgaria linked it to the July bombing of a tourist bus full of Israelis.

The Bulgarian Foreign Minister prepared to brief EU foreign ministers on the findings of their probe into the atrocity. The bomb that killed five along with the Bulgarian bus driver went off inadvertently as it was being planted.  DNA has linked two of the attackers as family members, (the dead bomber and the Canadian) and intelligence has identified the two remaining attackers who made their way back to Lebanon as an Australian and a Canadian.

Likely it is the sleeper cells who could theoretically be called upon at any time to swing into action in Europe that concern European countries. Intelligence reports indicate that operatives for Hezbollah are present throughout Belgium, Bosnia, Britain, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Denmark, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Lithuania, Norway, Romania, Russia Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey and Ukraine.

Germany alone, according to a 2011 report by the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution has 950 Hezbollah members in discreet place, ready to be called upon, to become more active than merely indulging in money laundering and fund-raising. The matter then comes down to letting that sleeping serpent lie undisturbed, or awakening it from its den and tackling it.