BBC News passes on Hamas terror financing story

Another Hamas terror financing story was not reported by the BBC.

On August 3rd the Israel Security Agency announced the exposure of a complex Hamas money laundering ring involving former security prisoners.

“Through this plot, which began in early 2016, the group [Hamas] managed to transfer approximately $200,000 (NIS 720,000) into its Hebron offices from Turkey, with help from Gaza, in order to fund terrorist activities, the Shin Bet said. […]

The head of the operation was identified by the security service as Muhammad Maher Bader, a senior member of Hamas in Hebron and a member of the Palestinian parliament.

Bader, who was arrested in June, enlisted the help of two couriers, Muasseb Hashalmon and Taha Uthman, both of them residents of Hebron, the Shin Bet said.

Hashalmon and Uthman would travel to Turkey, where they would receive tens of thousands of dollars from a Hamas operative named Haron Nasser al-Din.

According to the Shin bet, the two Palestinian men used the money to purchase commercial goods, which they would ship back to Hebron and sell. The money from the merchandise, save for a small percentage that was their cut, was then used to pay the salaries of Hamas’s high command in the West Bank city and was also given to active members of the terrorist group and to operatives who had been released from prison.”

The BBC has for a long time avoided providing its audiences with any serious reporting on the topic of Hamas’ presence in Palestinian Authority controlled areas and the connection of past and present Hamas operatives in Turkey to efforts to build up that presence. It was therefore not surprising to see that this latest story did not get any coverage at all.

However the BBC News website did have the space and inclination to publish a story it described as being about a “social media row over dog poo”.  One can only conclude that story was deemed by editors to contribute more to audience understanding of Middle East issues than the one about Hamas terror financing.

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