RL1294089, Passport;
00986426, Identification Number
Official reason
The U.S. Department of the Treasury targeted a key Hizballah support network today by designating Hizballah member Adham Tabaja, his company Al-Inmaa Group for Tourism Works, and its subsidiaries, as well as Lebanese businessman Kassem Hejeij and Hizballah Islamic Jihad member Husayn Ali Faour, who provide support and services to Hizballah. Tabaja is a Hizballah member and majority owner of the Lebanon-based real estate development and construction firm Al-Inmaa Group for Tourism Works. The company’s subsidiaries include Al-Inmaa Engineering and Contracting, which operates in Lebanon and Iraq, as well as Lebanon-based Al-Inmaa for Entertainment and Leisure Projects.
Tabaja maintains direct ties to senior Hizballah organizational elements, including the terrorist group’s operational component, the Islamic Jihad, and holds properties in Lebanon on behalf of the group. Tabaja’s company Al-Inmaa Engineering and Contracting has been one of the largest and most successful real estate businesses in Lebanon since the late 1990s and has been used by Hizballah as an investment mechanism. In 2006, Tabaja used his ties to Hizballah leadership to create a construction monopoly for Al-Inmaa Engineering and Contracting in the Hizballah-controlled Dahieh section of Beirut and Southern Lebanon.
More recently, Tabaja has used the Iraqi branches of Al-Inmaa Engineering and Contracting to obtain oil and construction development projects in Iraq that provide both financial support and organizational infrastructure to Hizballah. Tabaja and his companies have also sought to secure lucrative business contracts in the Green Zone areas of Baghdad, Iraq. Tabaja has worked with Hizballah officials, including E.O. 13224-designated Hizballah political official Shaykh Muhammad Kawtharani, for these projects.
On June 6, 2003, OFAC issued the Global Terrorism Sanctions Regulations, 31 CFR part 594 (68 FR 34196, June 6, 2003 (“the Regulations”), to implement Executive Order (E.O.) 13224 of September 23, 2001, “Blocking Property and Prohibiting Transactions With Persons Who Commit, Threaten To Commit, or Support Terrorism” (66 FR 49079, September 25, 2001). OFAC has amended the Regulations on several occasions.
On September 9, 2019, the President, invoking the authority of, inter alia, the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (50 U.S.C. 1701–1706) (IEEPA) and the United Nations Participation Act (22 U.S.C. 287c) (UNPA), issued E.O. 13886, “Modernizing Sanctions To Combat Terrorism” (84 FR 48041, September 12, 2019), effective September 10, 2019. In E.O. 13886, the President, finding it necessary to consolidate and enhance sanctions to combat acts of terrorism and threats of terrorism by foreign terrorists, terminated the national emergency declared in E.O. 12947 of January 23, 1995, “Prohibiting Transactions With Terrorists Who Threaten To Disrupt the Middle East Peace Process” (60 FR 5079, January 25, 1995), and revoked E.O. 12947, as amended by E.O. 13099 of August 20, 1998, “Prohibiting Transactions With Terrorists Who Threaten To Disrupt the Middle East Peace Process” (63 FR 45167, August 25, 1998). In addition, the President amended E.O. 13224, in order to build upon initial steps taken in E.O. 12947, to further strengthen and consolidate sanctions to combat the continuing threat posed by international terrorism, and in order to take additional steps to deal with the national emergency declared in E.O. 13224, with respect to the continuing and immediate threat of grave acts of terrorism and threats of terrorism committed by foreign terrorists, which include acts of terrorism that threaten the Middle East peace process.
Section 1 of E.O. 13886 replaces in its entirety section 1 of E.O. 13224, which had been amended by a number of prior Executive orders (E.O. 13224, as amended by all such authorities, is referred to herein as “amended E.O. 13224”), but does not amend the Annex to E.O. 13224, which was previously amended by E.O. 13268 of July 2, 2002, “Termination of Emergency With Respect to the Taliban and Amendment of Executive Order 13224 of September 23, 2001” (67 FR 44751, July 3, 2002) (“amended Annex to E.O. 13224”).
