Hezbollah Still Not a Major Threat in Latin America

Mike LaSusa has a good post at LobeLog on how the Hezbollah threat in Latin America is overblown.

To be sure, Latin American authorities must remain vigilant about terrorist threats. But they also must keep those threats in perspective and allocate their limited resources accordingly. Overblown claims like Levitt’s encourage countries to engage in the kind of security theater that leaves fundamental problems unaddressed and ultimately puts citizens at greater risk.

I've been repeating that basic point for a long time now with regard to U.S. policy.  Last year I wrote:

We need extremely high standards of evidence. Otherwise we do "stupid stuff." There are a lot of ill-informed but trigger-happy members of Congress and it would be a major mistake to let them dictate policy.

For years, we've seen a pattern of using weak sources to encourage a hawkish response. For many reasons, it's a bad idea.