New Target in War on Terror: Hamas
W A S H I N G T O N, Dec. 4, 2001 -- The Bush administration's financial war on terror has turned toward Hamas, the militant Palestinian group that claimed responsibility for the weekend's deadly suicide attacks in Israel.
The administration moved early this morning to freeze assets and accounts associated with what it describes as three front organizations and companies that funnel money to Hamas.
The main target is the Richardson, Texas-based Holy Land Foundation, a major fund-raiser for projects in the Palestinian territories, which raised $13 million last year. Also targeted are a bank and holding company based in the Palestinian territories, both of which are accused of having links to Hamas.
FBI and Treasury agents this morning raided Holy Land offices in San Diego, Paterson, N.J., Richardson, Texas, and Bridgeview, Ill.
Although it went into place at midnight, President Bush announced the move at a Rose Garden news conference with Attorney General John Ashcroft and Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill.
"Our action today is another step in the war on terrorism. It'snot the final step," Bush said. "There are more terrorist networks of globalreach, and more front groups who use, who seek to support them. Thenet is closing. Today, it just got tighter."
Hamas already is on the Treasury Department's list of targeted organizations. The group took responsibility for suicide bombing attacks in Israel this weekend that killed 26 people and wounded more than 200.
White House officials say the suicide bombings this weekend in Israel spurred the administration to take this action, which one official added was designed to send a blunt message to Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat and other Arab leaders in the Middle East: "Now they knew we mean business."
"Hamas is guilty of hundreds of other deaths over the years,and just in the past 12 months, it killed two Americans," Bush said. "And today weact."
Hamas Schools Teach Terror
In blunt language, Bush accused the Holy Land Foundation of funding the group.
"Money raised by theHoly Land Foundation is used by Hamas to support schools andindoctrinate children to grow up into suicide bombers," Bush said. "Money raised by the Holy Land Foundation is also used by Hamas to recruit suicidebombers and to support their families."
The other two companies are Beit el Mar Holdings, an investment company in East Jerusalem, the West Bank and Gaza, and El Aqsa Islamic Bank, which has offices in the Palestinian Authority and the West Bank and is partially owned by Beit el Mar and the Holy Land Foundation.
Officials at the Holy Land Foundation reacted with outrage — denying links to Hamas and warning of a Muslim backlash against the United States.
"The money they have seized is Muslim money, religious-mandated money," said the group's director, Shukri abu Bakr. "There is a lot to answer to in the Muslim community."
One former U.S. financial investigator sees today's move as a necessary part of shutting down terrorists' funding.
"Terrorist finance is a many-headed monster and in order to go after terrorist finance, you have to go after many of the heads simultaneously," said former State Department official Jonathan Winer. "Until the things that feed it no longer sustains the beast."