Hezbollah courier staked out Israeli sites in Europe

[oberliner]

LIMASSOL, Cyprus: A man on trial has admitted to being a member of the militant Lebanese Islamist movement Hezbollah, acting as a courier for the group inside the European Union and staking out locations that Israelis would frequent - in particular a parking lot behind a Limassol hospital and the Golden Arches hotel.

In a little-watched proceeding in a small courtroom, the defendant, Hossam Taleb Yaacoub, 24, described how he would be picked up in a van to meet his handler, whom he knew only as Ayman.

''I never saw the face of Ayman because he was always wearing a mask,'' Yaacoub said.

In written testimony read out in Greek by his interpreter, the man said that he had not taken part in a plot to target Israeli tourists visiting Cyprus, as prosecutors charge.

http://www.smh.com.au/world/hezbollah-courier-staked-out-israeli-sites-in-europe-20130221-2euae.html#ixzz2LX1ucFe2