Banks caught in Iranian propaganda war

"What else can go wrong?,” Lebanese bankers might ask these days as they flip through the news channels and jot down new additions to their “critical issues” list. When newscasts aren’t covering the civil war in neighboring Syria, commentators are wailing about volatile international markets and the European sovereign mess. What is more, record-low interest rates globally are limiting the range of investment options for Lebanon’s deposit-rich banks who are under intense international scrutiny, mainly spurred from Washington. Its all enough to keep a Lebanese bank manager up at night. Tormenting their insomnia last month was the United States-based anti-Iranian lobby group, United Against Nuclear Iran (UANI), which publicly accused Banque du Liban (BDL), Lebanon’s central bank, and the country’s private banking sector of laundering massive amounts of cash for Hezbollah, Iran and Syria. “The LBS [Lebanese Banking System] is a fraud” and “the focal point of the fraudulent Lebanese