For years, the United Nations Reduction and Works Company has despatched tens of millions of {dollars} every month to Gaza to pay staff and help hospitals, faculties and different infrastructure. The cash is wired from New York, the place the company has an workplace, to the West Financial institution, the place the money is loaded onto Brink’s vehicles and pushed throughout Israel to Gaza.
Based on a lawsuit filed Monday in federal court docket in Manhattan, a few of these {dollars} ended up funding the navy operations of Hamas, the Islamist group that has managed Gaza for almost 20 years and has pledged to erase the Jewish state. The cash path is on the coronary heart of the case towards seven present and former prime UNRWA officers who’re accused of realizing that Hamas siphoned off greater than $1 billion from the company to pay for, amongst different issues, tunneling tools and weapons that aided its assault on Israel on Oct. 7.
About 100 Israeli plaintiffs — together with at the least one who was held hostage by Hamas in Gaza, others who survived the assault, in addition to the estates of some who died — are looking for unspecified monetary damages. They declare that UNRWA is liable as a result of it helped fund Hamas, which the US and different international locations deem a terrorist group.
UNRWA has been sued a number of instances because the assaults, with some instances claiming that the company has abetted Hamas and others making an attempt to chop off UNRWA’s funding. The case filed on Monday goes additional, describing how the plaintiffs consider company cash ended up within the palms of Hamas and the way the terrorists used its sources within the assault on Israel.
The swimsuit says that in Gaza, not like different locations the company operates, UNRWA pays its 13,000 native staff in U.S. {dollars} that have to be become shekels, the Israeli forex that’s utilized in Gaza, by Hamas-affiliated money-changers who take a minimize for the group.
The civil swimsuit faces many hurdles, significantly the query of whether or not a treaty affords the U.N. officers immunity. But when the case proceeds, it may enable different victims of Hamas assaults to hunt damages from the U.N. Even when it fails, the swimsuit may strain nations donating cash to UNRWA to reassess their help.
“Hamas didn’t perform these atrocities with out help,” the criticism says. It was “aided and abetted” by senior company officers who for over a decade financed Hamas’s “terror infrastructure” and knew that they had been “offering Hamas with the U.S. {dollars} in money that it wanted to pay smugglers for weapons, explosives, and different terror materiel.”
Juliette Touma, a spokeswoman for the company, mentioned Monday that it knew of the swimsuit, however “has not been served with any authorized course of and, due to this fact, is just not ready to remark presently.”
A senior Hamas official didn’t instantly reply to a request for remark.
Hamas doesn’t have entry to the worldwide banking structure that permits simple switch of cash throughout borders. For a few years, Israel has allowed outdoors funds, together with cash from UNRWA, to be despatched to Gaza to pay for fundamental requirements. The Israeli authorities facilitated a yearslong effort by the Qataris to ship money for humanitarian operations. However there have been widespread questions as as to if the Qatari cash has been diverted by Hamas to pay for navy operations.
UNRWA was created in 1949 and is funded primarily via donations from U.N. member nations. The USA has lengthy been the biggest contributor, giving $371 million in 2023, almost 30 p.c of the company’s contributions, in keeping with a congressional report.
The defendants named within the swimsuit are Philippe Lazzarini, commissioner-general of UNRWA; Pierre Krähenbühl, the company’s former head, who’s now on the Worldwide Purple Cross; Leni Stenseth, Sandra Mitchell and Margot Ellis, who’re former deputy commissioners-general; Greta Gunnarsdottir, director of the company’s workplace in New York; and Filippo Grandi, the U.N. excessive commissioner for refugees.
A spokeswoman for Ms. Stenseth declined to touch upon the swimsuit, and a spokesman for Mr. Grandi referred all inquiries to the U.N. secretary normal’s workplace. Efforts to achieve the opposite defendants weren’t instantly profitable.
In an opinion essay written for The New York Instances final month, Mr. Lazzarini distinguished acts of people from the work of the company and mentioned allegations that UNRWA or different U.N. organizations had been engaged in terrorism “will additional diminish our instruments for peace and protection towards inhumanity world wide.”
Beneath a treaty between the US and United Nations, the 4 highest ranges of U.N. officers have full diplomatic immunity, in keeping with Larry Johnson, former deputy authorized counsel on the U.N. Decrease-level officers have “purposeful immunity,” which implies they can’t be sued for actions taken as a part of their jobs.
“We don’t consider UNRWA has immunity for aiding and abetting” the assaults on Israel,” Gavi Mairone, a human rights lawyer representing the plaintiffs, mentioned in a press release.
The plaintiffs’ legal professionals argue that the UNRWA officers will be sued in U.S. court docket as a result of the company has a New York workplace, raised funds in New York and used banks primarily based in New York. The legal professionals additionally mentioned the Alien Tort Statutes enable non-Individuals to sue in U.S. federal court docket for accidents suffered because of a violation of worldwide legal guidelines.
The swimsuit depends on an extended and tortuous path of money that stretches from Manhattan to the Center East.
Based on the criticism, the company every month would ask JPMorgan Chase to wire million of {dollars} to the New York department of Arab Financial institution, which has its headquarters in Jordan and is likely one of the area’s largest monetary establishments. The Arab Financial institution then transmitted the cash to its department in Ramallah, within the West Financial institution.
There, the cash earmarked for UNRWA operations in Gaza was transferred to the Financial institution of Palestine in Ramallah after which withdrawn as U.S. {dollars} in money, loaded onto Brink’s vehicles and pushed throughout Israel to Gaza.
Brink’s and JPMorgan Chase declined to remark. Arab Financial institution and the Financial institution of Palestine didn’t reply to requests to talk about the case.
The swimsuit argues that if UNRWA paid its Gaza workers in shekels, the cash might be despatched electronically, lowering the necessity to pay charges to Hamas-affiliated cash changers. “Solely Hamas advantages from UNRWA’s present cash-handling practices,” in keeping with the criticism.
The criticism says the group used the cash “to purchase by way of smugglers its weapons, ammunition, explosives, building supplies for the tunnels and rocket-making provides.”
The plaintiffs’ legal professionals mentioned the sources they used to ascertain particulars of the cash path included U.N. audits of UNRWA’s funds and an U.N. investigation of the company, in addition to press experiences that embrace feedback from UNRWA concerning the motion of cash from New York into Gaza and the allocation of these funds.
The criticism doesn’t reveal what proof the plaintiffs will current to show with certainty that UNRWA cash in Gaza was used to finance the Oct. 7 assault. Nor does the criticism present particular particulars to help the declare that Hamas controls the forex exchanges.
However a report by Key Support Consulting for UNRWA in 2018 mentioned that the exchanges are open to “leakage,” which incorporates “misappropriation, fraud, corruption, double-counting and any irregularity thought of as a diversion of money grants or vouchers from professional makes use of.”
Monday’s swimsuit claims that whether or not the officers knew particularly concerning the Oct. 7 assaults is irrelevant, as a result of they knew that “Hamas overtly proclaimed its purpose to focus on and homicide harmless civilians” and knew that any help would assist.
UNRWA has lengthy been accused of getting hyperlinks to Hamas. In January, Israel accused a dozen company staff of enjoying a task within the assaults on Oct. 7 or of their aftermath. The U.N. mentioned that it had fired a number of staff after being briefed on the allegations. The accusations prompted eight international locations, together with the US, to droop some assist to UNRWA.
In April, an impartial assessment commissioned by the United Nations mentioned that Israel had not offered proof that a lot of UNRWA’s 1000’s of staff are members of terrorist organizations. That prompted a number of nations to start making donations once more.
Adam Rasgon and Patrick Kingsley contributed reporting.
