“While World Vision is now the focus of attention following the arrest of El-Halabi and the scale of the allegations, this should be a cautionary moment for many other worldwide aid organizations that have similar operations in Gaza, such as Oxfam, Care, Christian Aid, and UNRWA – the United Nations Relief and Works Agency”.
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Abu Zuhri called on the worldwide community to bear its responsibility over such “practices which could have unsafe consequences”.
Israel’s Shin Bet domestic security agency says Waheed Borsh, 38, an engineer working for the United Nations development agency UNDP in the Gaza Strip since 2003, was indicted on Tuesday.
“The investigation”, the Shin Bet said, “exemplifies the manner in which Hamas takes advantage of global aid agencies’ resources, meant to serve as humanitarian aide for Gaza’s civilian population”.
According to the Shin Bet internal security agency, Mohammed al-Halabi diverted $7.2 million (6.5 million euros) each year since 2010 to Hamas and its military wing, though his charge sheet does not specify an amount.
Hamas has denied any connection to Halabi. The Christian charity said it runs internal and independent audits and evaluations regularly to make sure that aid is properly given to the intended recipients, Al Jazeera relays. In particular, Hamas has a history of raiding aid warehouses and convoys as well as developing tax schemes created to skim money off of worldwide largesse. Israel’s arrest of the Gaza director of an evangelical Christian aid group for redirecting millions of dollars in assistance to the militant group Hamas has sent shock waves throughout the Palestinian territories and left many anxious that the incident will jeopardize all charity missions, even as Gaza struggles to recover from a war two years ago. Mr. Borsh confessed to helping Hamas during an investigation, it added.
Nahshon further noted that Israel stressed that it expects the United Nations to publish an immediate condemnation of Hamas’ abuse of worldwide aid to Gaza.
During his interrogation, Borsh also gave Israeli security officers information on other employees of worldwide aid organizations with ties to Hamas, along with the locations of “tunnels and military bases which he had been exposed to during his work in Gaza”. “But this case is likely to impact donor projects in the West Bank as well as Gaza with more conditions being imposed by donors”.
But Nitsana Darshan-Leitner, president of Shurat HaDin, an Israeli legal rights institute that provides representation and resources for victims of Palestinian terror attacks, said the Shin Bet’s charges should come as no surprise to World Vision’s leadership.
Israeli authorities have also accused a Gaza-based employee of Save the Children of having been recruited by Halabi to assist the Qassam Brigades.
World Vision Germany spokeswoman Silvia Holten said the charity’s budget in Gaza in the last decade totaled $22.5 million.
World Vision had appointed a Palestinian lawyer and his son had denied the charges, he said Monday.
Nearly immediately after the indictment against the UNDP employee was announced, pro-Israel pressure group “UN Watch” urged action at what it called “the apparently pervasive subversion in Gaza of UN and other global humanitarian aid funds by Hamas”. But according to declassified intelligence reports, these supplies are routinely stolen by Hamas in order to serve the group’s terrorist purposes. El-Halabi’s father has said his son was not a member of Hamas.
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Borsh revealed that other Palestinians employed by humanitarian aid organizations in the Gaza Strip are also collaborating with Hamas, which the government said “demonstrates how Hamas exploits the resources of global aid organizations at the expense of the civilian population of the Gaza Strip”.
