Unraveling the Sanctions: An Investigative Report on Jihad Al-Arab's Case
05 Feb 202414:24 PM
Unraveling the Sanctions: An Investigative Report on Jihad Al-Arab's Case
On October 28, 2021, the US Treasury imposed sanctions on prominent Lebanese politicians and tycoons, including businessman Jihad Al-Arab. 

Lebanese people believed that the United States of America was fighting corruption in Lebanon through concrete files, until a source from the Treasury brought to the attention of MTV news team that it is highly likely that the case of Al-Arab might be reconsidered and reevaluated.

In September 12, 2023, one of our correspondents in the United States asked the Spokesperson for the United States Department of State, Matthew Miller, if the US Government might impose sanctions inadvertently or erroneously on individuals, to which Miller answered that, “obviously if we make mistakes, we try to correct those, if you have a specific case you want to bring up, I'd be happy to take a question."

According to a US source, a legal team from Morgan Lewis law firm, as well as American Lawyer Celine Atallah and former attorney general of New Hampshire Bill Shaheen, husband of the Senator Jean Shaheen, are handling the case of Jihad Al-Arab.

In an interview with MTV Lebanon News, Lawyer Bill Shaheen said: "I'm going to give them the benefit of the doubt that they made a mistake - and they made a mistake - and I think they need to fix it."

Our correspondent led another interview with Lawyer Celine Atallah as well, where she stated that, “we did not agree on getting involved in Mr. Al-Arab’s case before making sure that he was unjustly accused, after reviewing the administrative records we retrieved from the Treasury, and found out that outrageous mistakes were made.

The mistakes Atallah mentioned are as follow:

In the first charge against him, Jihad Al-Arab was accused of spending 18 million US dollars to build bridge, when the company actually secured a bid of roughly 10.8 billion Lebanese Lira, which amounts to almost 7.2 million USD and was allocated for building a tunnel not a bridge as mentioned in the charge. According to governor of Beirut Marwan Abboud, the tunnel was finished on time, and is being regularly maintained under the supervision of professional international companies. Abboud added that he asked Mr. Al-Arab to carry on providing maintenance for the tunnel even after the expiration of his contract.

The second charge against Al-Arab mentions that he is the mastermind behind the meeting between Michel Aoun and Saad Hariri in France that led Michel Aoun to become President, knowing very well that Al-Arab has never in his life, met both Aoun and Hariri together. That, and the fact that he does not get involved in politics. It is important to note that many TV interviews were held with the concerned individuals to address who was the actual mastermind behind this meeting.

The third charge against him has to do with the Costa Brava trash dump, that according to the Lebanese government was supposed to be temporary, and where the works were done under the supervision of international companies. The Treasury mentioned that the contract given to Al-Arab amounted to a sum of 288 million US dollars after an open tender in 2016, when the actual sum in the executed contract amounted to 53.2 million USD, which proves that mistakes were made in the sum displayed by the Treasury.

His fourth charge was adding water to trash bins to make them heavier in order to collect more money from them, which is incorrect because it is a work beyond the scope of his company's business.

In the end, the US Government is dealing with a case of a Lebanese citizen, and we are awaiting the verdict that should be passed in the upcoming months.