Swiss decide against banning Hezbollah

The Swiss government, which previously drafted a law explicitly banning Hamas activities and support for the Palestinian terror group, decided this week against doing the same for Hezbollah in Lebanon.

Parliamentary security policy committees had called for a ban on Hezbollah, but in its response, published today, the federal government says the conditions had not been met.

Switzerland’s Federal Council says the group could not be banned as a threat to security under the country’s intelligence act because the existing law required sanctions or a ban by the United Nations to be in place for such a move to be applied.

It said it banned Hamas over the “unprecedented terrorist attacks” of October 7, 2023, in line with the practice of proscribing organizations on a case-by-case basis only “for extremely serious reasons.”

“Bans on organizations must continue to follow this political line,” it says, judging that it was “not appropriate” to create a new law to ban Hezbollah.

The lower house of parliament’s security committee had said that “like Hamas, Hezbollah is a radical Islamic terrorist organization responsible for numerous acts of violence and human rights violations” which “represents a threat to the stability of the entire region.”

It demanded that the government “issue a comprehensive ban on Hezbollah.”

Parliament will consider the government’s position during its December 2-20 session, and will also vote on the law to ban Hamas, Swiss news agency Keystone-ATS reports.