Israel on Tuesday said it indicted a Palestinian U.N. employee in the Gaza Strip, accusing him of assisting the territory’s Islamic militant Hamas rulers, just days after it charged the Gaza manager of the global charity World Vision for allegedly funneling millions to the group.
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On Thursday, Israeli authorities said that the director of the Gaza office of World Vision, Mohammed El-Halabi, had admitted to funneling about 7.2 million USA dollars a year to Hamas over five years.
According to the Shin Bet, during the investigation, “it was discovered that he had been instructed by a senior member of Hamas to redirect his work for UNDP to serve Hamas’ military interests”.
“This investigation proves yet again the way in which Hamas exploits aid resources of worldwide groups in the Gaza Strip which are meant for the civilian population”, the Shin Bet said, adding Bursh had been indicted in an Israeli court.
Israeli authorities have charged a Palestinian employee of a United Nations agency in the Gaza Strip of providing “material assistance” to Hamas. It conducts development and rehabilitation projects for the Palestinian population of the Gaza Strip, which include assisting in the rehabilitation of housing damaged during armed conflicts.
The Shin Bet announcement came after, last week, it was revealed that funds from global aid agency World Vision were allegedly used to aid Hamas.
Zuhri denied the accusations, saying they are “false and have no basis”.
It is the second indictment of a Gaza Palestinian aid worker accused of assisting Hamas in the last week.
According to the Shin Bet internal security agency, the investigation into El-Halabi’s activities uncovered a network of additional Hamas terrorists posing as aid workers.
The World Vision statement said Halabi became the its Gaza chief in 2014 and would have only had the personal authority to sign off a budget of up to $15,000.
World Vision, which routinely audits its own aid spending to ensure the money gets where it is meant to go, has in the past identified such diversionary fraud by its own employees.
In a further related development, Israeli authorities have also accuseda Gaza-based employee of Save the Children of having been recruited for Al-Qassam Brigades by Halabi.
The allegations against el-Halabi and Borsh, 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.
World Vision also said its cumulative operating budget in Gaza over the past 10 years was about $22.5 million, and that the figure didn’t reconcile with the roughly $50 millionIsrael alleged had been diverted. This is not Israel’s fault, as building supplies flow regularly into Gaza.
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Hamas, an Islamist political and militant group, seeks the creation of an independent state of Palestine and wants Israel to withdraw from the Palestinian territories it occupied after the 1967 war.
