Hamas Stealing Turkish Aid Money to Fund Terror

March 22, 2017

Wednesday, 22 March 2017 | Two Palestinian men have been charged with funneling funds from Turkish charities earmarked for Gaza reconstruction to the terrorist group Hamas, Israel’s internal security service announced on Tuesday.

The Shin Bet said that Muhammad Murtaja, the Gaza coordinator of the Turkish Cooperation and Development Agency (TİKA), was arrested in February as he attempted to travel from Gaza to Turkey, The Times of Israel reported. Another suspect, Mehmet Kaya, the head of the Turkish Humanitarian Relief Foundation (IHH), has not yet been apprehended.

“The egotistical Hamas terror organization has robbed funds that are meant for the needy of Gaza from international organizations,” said Maj. Gen. Yoav Mordechai, coordinator of government activities in the territories. “Hamas prospers at the expense of the residents of the Strip and uses donations meant for them to finance terror.”

According to the Shin Bet, Hamas recruited Murtaja in 2008 in order to siphon charitable funds meant for “meaningful humanitarian projects.” He is believed to have diverted “millions of shekels” in aid for needy Gazans and instead arranged for individuals who “were apparently Hamas military operatives and their families” to receive the funds.

Murtaja carried out the embezzlement with the knowledge of Hamas’s leadership, “with Ismail Haniyeh at its head,” the Shin Bet said. Following his recruitment, Murtaja also participated in “training and military exercises, manufacturing weapons and improvised explosive devices and digging terror tunnels,” the agency added.

During his interrogation, Murtaja gave the Shin Bet “operational information” about Hamas’ network of terror tunnels, as well as its future war plans.

Kaya similarly diverted aid from the IHH, which is considered a terrorist organization by Israel and the Netherlands and is banned by Germany for its support of Hamas, in order to “directly fund the activities of Hamas’s military wing,” the Shin Bet charged. The IHH was behind the 2010 Mavi Marmara flotilla which attempted to break Israel’s legal naval blockade of Gaza and precipitated a diplomatic crisis between Israel and Turkey.

The Shin Bet said that the money Kaya gave Hamas was used to establish a training base for naval commandos, as well as to purchase arms and munitions.

“This investigation shows the embezzlement methods used by Hamas against the international community and humanitarian aid organizations,” the Shin Bet said. This fraud “diverts money and resources that are meant for the reconstruction of the Gaza Strip and needy populations.”

Posted on March 22, 2017

Source: (This article was originally published by The Israel Project, in its publication The Tower on 21 March 2017. Time related language has been modified to reflect our republication today. See the original article at this link.)

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