A Lebanese migrant caught trying to infiltrate into the United States told border authorities he belonged to the Iranian-backed Hezbollah organization and had planned to commit a terrorist attack on U.S. soil, The New York Post reported on Sunday.
Basel Ebbadi, 22, was nabbed on March 9 near El Paso, Texas. He told authorities he aimed to reach New York and was “going to try to make a bomb,” according to an official document cited by the report.
Ebbadi confessed to training with Hezbollah for seven years and guarding weapons sites for another four years, internal U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) documents indicated. His mission focused on “jihad” and killing those who are “not Muslim,” said the report.
He was placed in isolation and referred for interrogation by the Tactical Terrorism Response Team (TTRT) for making “terroristic threats to personnel.”
U.S. border agents recorded 172 encounters with terror-watchlisted individuals in the 2023 fiscal year that ended Sept. 20. Fifty-nine such individuals were apprehended in the first four months of 2024, according to federal data cited by the report.
Hezbollah launched a low-intensity conflict against Israel in support of Hamas following the Palestinian terror group’s Oct. 7 invasion and massacre of 1,200 Israelis.
