Ellissa Holding

Editorial illustration: Ellissa Holding

Original editorial illustration of a corporate parent-subsidiary structure and used-car lot; no individual transaction is depicted.

Ellissa Holding was a holding company designated in the U.S. Treasury’s January 2011 action against Ayman Joumaa’s drug-trafficking and money-laundering organization. Treasury said Ali Mohammed Kharroubi owned it and that it controlled nine companies in Lebanon, Benin and the Democratic Republic of Congo. It specifically named Ellissa Group SA as a Benin subsidiary involved in used-car sales in Africa. These corporate links place the companies in a designated network but do not, by themselves, identify each car sale as a drug-money transaction.

Identity and network record

Treasury identified Ellissa Holding as designated, its owner as Ali Mohammed Kharroubi, and Ellissa Group SA as its subsidiary in Benin. It also designated Ellissa Exchange Company, one of the Lebanese exchanges used by Joumaa’s organization. The release does not list the individual role of every subsidiary or establish that all nine subsidiaries acted as exchange houses.

Ellissa Group SA’s described business was selling used cars in Africa. A later Treasury action described a wider Joumaa-linked pattern in which U.S.-purchased used vehicles were shipped to West Africa and proceeds moved through exchange houses, including Halawi and Rmeiti after earlier disruptions. These accounts show why the car business matters to the network map. The 2013 description of Halawi cash shipments cannot automatically be assigned to Ellissa Group SA.

In the December 2011 civil complaint account, DOJ said vehicles purchased through the wider Lebanese bank-and-exchange network were shipped mainly to Cotonou, where a car park owned by Ellissa Group, a subsidiary of Ellissa Holding, sold them. DOJ alleged that some cash proceeds moved back through Hezbollah-controlled courier channels. A named car park and a pleaded route establish a more specific role than the holding-company designation alone, while the government’s aggregate $329 million wire figure cannot be assigned entirely to Ellissa.

The 2013 Treasury action stated the agency believed Hezbollah replaced designated Ellissa owner Kharroubi with Haitham Rmeiti as a key funds-transfer facilitator. That is a person-level assessment; the cited releases do not provide an Ellissa Group SA payment to Hezbollah. Ownership, designation, business activity and the separately attributed facilitator assessment describe different relationships; they do not establish one traced payment.

Corporate functions

The amended complaint located Ellissa Exchange in Sarafand, Lebanon; Ellissa Group SA’s car park in Cotonou, Benin; and Ellissa Shipping’s activity in carrying used cars through Cotonou port. It identified Jamal Mohamad Kharoubi and Ali Mohammed Kharroubi as principal owners and controllers of the holding company. This account separates the parent, exchange, vehicle-sales subsidiary and shipping operation.

The civil allegations

Paragraph 35 of the amended complaint alleged that Ellissa Holding and its affiliates, alongside other named participants, supplied funds, goods or services for Hezbollah’s benefit. It described fees and commissions paid to members and supporters involved at stages of the used-car and money-transfer scheme. This was a broader pleaded allegation than the Treasury release’s corporate list. It was not a judgment or a quantified, individually traced payment from Ellissa Group SA to Hezbollah.

Separate transfer populations

The complaint attributed $61,747,524 in car-related wires to Ellissa Exchange during January 2007–January 2011. Its ARZ Export example separately listed $1,327,474 from Ellissa Group in 23 wires, $215,446 from the exchange in four wires, and $84,968 from Ali Kharoubi in one wire. These rows distinguish the senders; the exchange-wide amount and particular buyer examples are not additional sums to combine into a new estimate for the holding company.

Requested relief

The complaint sought civil money-laundering penalties of no less than $61,747,524 from Ellissa Holding, including Ellissa Exchange. The amount reflects the government’s requested relief and alleged transaction population. It does not establish that a court awarded that sum, that the company paid it, or that it represented a measured benefit to Hezbollah.

Blocked vehicles

An asset schedule separately listed approximately 350 cars consigned to Ellissa Holding at locations in the United States as blocked under its January 2011 designation. Those vehicles were a distinct asset category from the exchange’s wire-transfer totals. Their listing did not report a completed forfeiture, a sale price or a criminal verdict against the holding company.

Responses and separate outcomes

Contemporary reporting carried denials from the exchange houses targeted in 2013. Halawi said it complied with Lebanese requirements and maintained client and source-of-funds documents, while Rmeiti rejected the accusation and challenged the evidence. These responses qualify the agencies’ account of the replacement financial channels; they are not admissions by the Ellissa businesses or Kharroubi.

LCB’s related case ended in a $102 million civil forfeiture, with the bank’s denial preserved in the agreement. The bank’s settlement and Hassan Ayash Exchange’s separate resolution did not settle every allegation against other participants. Treasury’s broader assessment that the Joumaa network benefited Hezbollah does not establish that every exchange-house payment was Hezbollah’s money.

Research interpretation

Noam Binstok, Orna Mizrahi and Esteban Klor’s May 2026 INSS analysis describes trade, currency exchange and informal settlement as interacting mechanisms. The model helps explain why ownership, commercial sales and financial intermediaries appear together in the Ellissa records. It does not allocate every company payment to its owner, establish the origin of every sale or determine the amount ultimately received by Hezbollah.

See also

• Hezbollah Business Affairs Component
• Lebanese Canadian Bank

References

Legal and sanctions status as of 4 October 2026.