On Thursday, World Vision official Mohammad El Halabi faced court in Beersheba over charges of funneling charity funding to support Hamas fighters and to buy weapons.
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Israel accused him of stealing around $7.2 million a year, or around 60 per cent of all of World Vision’s funds for Gaza.
The UN chief for aid and development for Palestine has warned of the potential humanitarian fallout from a scandal around aid agency funds allegedly being diverted to Hamas.
Australia’s Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) called the allegations “deeply troubling” and said in a statement that it was “urgently seeking more information from World Vision and the Israeli authorities”. Israel’s Ambassador to the UN, Danny Danon said the UN must do more to put an end to the “exploitation” of the UN by Hamas.
When Israeli authorities last week accused a senior staffer for a leading Christian relief group of diverting charity funds to Hamas, they signaled he would not be the last – and now a United Nations agency employee has been indicted for allegedly supporting the Palestinian terror group.
The allegations, if proven correct, would bolster Israel’s arguments for maintaining its blockade of Gaza, imposed after Hamas seized power in the coastal strip in 2007. Shin Bet alleges that he fraudulently listed the children of Hamas operatives as wounded, created straw organizations, and inflated project costs to divert cash, according to the AP.
Mr. Borsh had worked for the agency in Gaza since 2003 and his areas of responsibility included demolishing houses damaged during armed conflicts and clearing the rubbish from sites after demolition, the Shin Bet said.
A spokesperson for Save the Children said that none of the organisation’s employees has been arrested or charged, and that they had received no details from Israeli authorities.
The security agency also said that since his arrest, el-Halabi divulged intelligence about employees working for United Nations agencies and other aid groups who were also assisting Hamas, without elaborating.
Last week, Halabi was charged by ISA with funnelling tens of millions of dollars of aid money to Al-Qassam Brigades, an accusation that the global charity has reiterated is incompatible with the NGO’s Gaza budget.
The UN said on Tuesday it was “greatly concerned” at Israeli claims and promised “a thorough internal review of the processes and circumstances surrounding the allegation”. “They are part of a plan to further the siege of the Gaza Strip by means of global aid institutions”, as quoted by the Jerusalem Post newspaper. On Aug. 4, some 50 days after he was detained, he was charged with providing support to Hamas.
Hamas is designated a terrorist group by Israel, the US, EU, and United Kingdom among other countries.
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Its president Kevin Jenkins said in a statement the organization was conducting an investigation into the allegations but had “not seen any of the evidence”.
