U.S. tax dollars may have helped fund terrorism—and internal audits prove it. A new lawsuit alleges that UNRWA, the UN agency responsible for Palestinians, knowingly enabled a money-laundering scheme that funneled U.S. currency to Hamas.
According to Avery Samet, a lawyer involved in the case, UNRWA was transferring hard U.S. currency into Gaza every month—by armored car. The problem? Gaza doesn’t operate on U.S. dollars.
So what was the point? UNRWA claimed Gazan staff wanted to be paid in dollars. But because dollars aren’t usable in Gaza’s local economy, employees were forced to exchange them for the local shekel and money changers—controlled by Hamas.
Through inflated conversion rates and service fees, Hamas was able to skim between two to four million dollars every month. More importantly, they gained access to physical U.S. cash which is what terrorist groups like Hamas use to purchase weapons and supplies on the black market.
A 2018 UNRWA-commissioned study laid out exactly how this money laundering worked, and how it could become UNRWA’s undoing. Employees even warned that refusing to participate could get them killed by Hamas. Despite those warnings, UNRWA continued to look the other way—and when they got caught, they claimed legal immunity from prosecution.
The lawsuit targets UNRWA and its top leadership, including Commissioner-General Philippe Lazzarini, for enabling terrorism in plain sight.
Under U.S. law, knowingly laundering money to a designated terror organization like Hamas is a federal crime. And this lawsuit could be the first step in holding UNRWA accountable for years of corruption, negligence, and complicity in terror financing.
