The Imam Al-Mahdi Scouts Association: Hezbollah’s youth movement which indoctrinates youth with Iranian radical Shiite Islam and serves as a source of youngsters who join Hezbollah | The Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center

Hezbollah maintains an extensive network of social foundations in the Shiite community in Lebanon. These foundations deal with healthcare, education, finance, welfare, and media. They support Hezbollah’s military infrastructure. They also serve as a means of disseminating Hezbollah’s ideology and strengthening its position among the Shiite community and in Lebanon in general. They provide the Shiite community with large-scale social services that are generally provided by the state while exploiting the weakness of the Lebanese administration and its long-standing neglect of the Shiite community. Thus, Hezbollah’s civilian infrastructure enables it to maintain a sort of “Shiite mini-state” within the Lebanese state. The residents of this “Shiite mini-state” enjoy large-scale Iranian financial support and Hezbollah’s military infrastructure is located among them.