January 24, 2026
Erem News
In recent weeks, the United States has expanded its moves to dry up Hezbollah’s sources of funding in a number of African countries, secretly sending a senior official from the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) to Ivory Coast, with the aim of accelerating sensitive investigations related to financial networks suspected of financing the party, according to media reports issued by media outlets in the United Arab Emirates.
According to the report published by the Emirati website “Erm News”, based on Hebrew and international sources, the secret visit took place in mid-January in the city of Abidjan, the economic capital of Ivory Coast, and included sending Colin Maguire, head of the West Africa Unit of the FBI, who resides in Dakar, Senegal.
The report indicated that Washington considers the pace of local investigations “slow,” and seeks to achieve rapid and tangible progress against what it describes as “financial structures” active in West Africa, and suspected of being used to finance Hezbollah, including networks operating from Ivory Coast.
The report pointed out that since 2024, a representative of the US Treasury Department has been working in Abidjan, whose mission is to monitor the movement of suspicious funds, monitor money laundering operations, and follow up on financing paths for extremist activities, indicating that this file is subject to close monitoring by the administration of US President Donald Trump.
According to the information received, the investigations, which were launched in the spring of 2025, focus on a number of economic sectors, most notably real estate, travel agencies, trade in luxury products, diamonds, and luxury cars, in addition to import and export activities. The report also indicated that a number of bank accounts belonging to travel agencies were frozen during the past year as a precautionary measure.
The report quoted officials in Ivory Coast as confirming the adoption of a “zero tolerance” policy towards any financing related to terrorism, stressing that investigations are conducted within the framework of the law and national sovereignty, noting that some files are complex and include sophisticated and overlapping financial mechanisms.
In a related context, the report cited what it described as “recent studies” indicating that businessmen identified as affiliated with or close to Hezbollah control about 60% of commercial activity in Ivory Coast, while supply companies and stores owned by Lebanese Shiites are spread across large areas within the country.
The report also referred to semi-official data published by the Al Jazeera Center for Studies stating that the Lebanese Shiite community owns about 80% of coffee and cocoa collection and export companies in Ivory Coast, while other studies estimated a similar presence of the Lebanese community in the diamond trade in Sierra Leone.
The report concluded that researchers believe that the influence of the Lebanese communities in West Africa, especially the Shiite community, has enabled them to play an influential role in some local policies, including supporting electoral campaigns in more than one country, amid estimates indicating that the number of members of the Lebanese community in Ivory Coast exceeds 90,000, while the number of Lebanese in Senegal exceeds 30,000, in addition to the presence of similar gatherings in Gambia, Nigeria, and a number of countries on the African continent.
