NEW YORK – A businessman was charged with providing satellite broadcasts of a Hezbollah television station to New York-area customers, authorities said Thursday.
Javed Iqbal, 42, was arrested Wednesday on conspiracy charges of enabling the broadcasts of al Manar, which was designated by the U.S. government this spring as a global terrorist entity, U.S. Attorney Michael Garcia said in a statement.
Garcia said Iqbal used satellite dishes at his Staten Island home to distribute the broadcasts through a Brooklyn company called HDTV Limited.
The probe began after a tip from a confidential source in February, according to papers filed in U.S. District Court in Manhattan.
The U.S. government considers Hezbollah, Lebanon's most sophisticated Shiite group, to be a terrorist group. An attack by Hezbollah guerrillas on an Israeli outpost last month plunged Lebanon and Israel into 34 days of destruction that killed more than 800 people.
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