Larisa Alexandrovna - Current and former intelligence officials say the Bush Administration's National Intelligence Estimate regarding terrorist threats to the United States does not provide evidence to support its assertions and may have inflated the domestic threat posed by the Lebanese political and military group Hezbollah, perhaps because it receives financial support from Iran.

According to the report, Hezbollah – a Shi's Muslim group with ties to Iran that has been labeled a terrorist organization by the United States – may target the US domestically if the US poses a serious threat to Iran. But sources say the allegations about Hezbollah were simply "thrown in.

Speaking under condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly, several intelligence officers asserted that the report was sloppy and lacked supporting evidence. "The NIE seems… fiddled [with]," regarding Hezbollah, one high-ranking CIA official said. "Whether it is or isn't is not really the point. The point is that nobody is ready to believe it."

As regards to the Hezbollah 'threat,'" the official added, "they just threw that in. "Nobody in CIA talks to Hezbollah, and they're living off their assessments from back in the 80s, which they really never got right anyway.

Former CIA case officer Robert Baer – a 20-year intelligence professional with expertise in the Middle East on whose book See No Evil the award winning film Syriana was based – is skeptical that Hezbollah will launch domestic attacks on US soil.

Hezbollah had all the opportunity and motivation to [attack the U.S] during the last 24 years," Baer said in a conversation with RAW STORY last Friday. "Why in god's name would Hezbollah resort to terrorism against the west when it got what it wanted?

You'll know there's a Hezbollah domestic threat when the FBI makes a serious arrest" in relation to a terrorist plot. Read all @ at-Largely