On Friday, just hours before U.S. Secretary of State Anthony Blinken landed in Istanbul to hold difficult talks with Turkish authorities over the two countries' conflicting positions on the Gaza war, his office announced a reward of up to $10 million (April 9). million euros) for information about five members of the financial structure of the “terrorist” organization Hamas, three of whom are believed to be based in Turkey.
Israel's leaders and their allies in Washington are convinced that to end the Palestinian Islamist militia they must attack its sources of funding and a structure that includes companies and millions of dollars invested in various countries, including a once-reliable ally like Turkey , which over the past decade has welcomed leaders of the group it considers a “liberation movement.”
As a terrorist group or resistance movement, Hamas's armed struggle costs money: buying weapons, maintaining military infrastructure (drone and missile factories, tunnels, bunkers and barracks), paying fighters' salaries and compensating the families of the deceased. And Gaza, the group's base of operations, is not exactly an economic garden: The Israeli blockade has left half of Gaza's residents unemployed and brought the population to a per capita income of just under 1,150 dollars, around 1,000 euros. So where does the economic infrastructure to support Hamas come from?
“Until Hamas took control of the Gaza Strip government, it was funded largely thanks to Iran and the abuse of charities,” explains Matthew Levitt, director of the Counterterrorism Program at the Washington Institute and a former US Treasury Department official to EL PAÍS. and from the FBI: “But for the last 10 or 15 years, their main source of income has been the control of territory in Gaza.” Hamas's operational and military budget is estimated at around 550 million euros per year, which is the level of military spending by states with one population similar to Gaza, such as Slovenia, Latvia or Armenia. Or what is the same, just over 230 euros per capita (Israel's military spending per capita is ten times higher).
The Hamas government imposes taxes on the import of products through the border crossings and, when they are not open, through the tunnels that supply the strip from Egypt. Together with trade taxes, the income amounts to around 450 million euros per year. At the same time, Gaza receives around $2 billion (1.85 billion euros) annually from the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank and from international cooperation, including the United Nations, the European Union and Qatar. The latter supplies $360 million annually – until a few years ago in briefcases full of cash – to pay the salaries of civil servants and help the neediest families, according to an agreement signed with Benjamin Netanyahu's government.
Experts like Levitt assume that not all of the money budgeted for Gaza goes to the population, but that some of it is mixed with Hamas's operational expenses, for example payments to fighters who are formally employed as civil servants: after the attack On October 7, Israeli authorities revealed the identities of some attackers who allegedly worked as police officers and Gaza government officials. This source of income ends in practical destruction and new Israeli occupation of the Gaza Strip.
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Iran remains a clear and conspicuous contributor, particularly to Hamas' armed wing, the Ezedin al-Qasam Brigades. The organization's own political leader, Ismail Haniya, admitted in an interview with the Al Jazeera network in 2022 that Iran had contributed $70 million (63 million euros) to strengthen its defenses. And expert estimates vary between that number and 120 million per year. In addition, the Palestinian group continues to receive donations from the Palestinian diaspora and individuals in different parts of the world through crowdfunding campaigns that it announces through social networks. The funds are sent to Gaza via the hawala method or via cryptocurrencies, the latter of which has proven to be less secure as they can be traced thanks to blockchain technology. U.S. and Israeli intelligence agencies have reported that key hubs for these transfers – currency and cryptocurrency exchange houses – used by Hamas are located in Turkey.
Hamas trading center
But to avoid this dependence on donors – for example, Tehran's contributions were significantly reduced when Hamas allied with the Syrian opposition against allied regime Iran at the beginning of the last decade – the Palestinian group set up a finance committee, whose leaders have survived Abroad for more than three decades (first in Jordan, then in Saudi Arabia and later in Turkey) and an investment office dependent on Hamas' Shura Council. According to US intelligence, Zaher Jabarin has been the head of Hamas Finance since 2017 and is said to be living in Turkey; The investment office was led by Ahmed Odeh, Usama Ali and Hisham Qafisheh and all have lived in or traveled through Turkey. Qafisheh, who held leadership positions in several Hamas-run companies, obtained Turkish citizenship in 2021 and changed his name to Hasmet Aslan, according to data from the commercial register consulted by EL PAÍS.
The U.S. Treasury Department estimates that Hamas' assets abroad amount to $500 million and include companies such as the Al-Zawaya Group, which has subsidiaries in Cyprus, Turkey, Spain (a real estate company in Valencia) and Sudan and in which it received hefty contracts in roads, mining and the agricultural sector in this African country until the fall of the Islamist dictator Omar al Bashir. In recent months, the United States has also sanctioned other construction and real estate development companies it considers part of the militia's financial network, such as Algeria's Sidar, Saudi's Anda and Emirati's Itqan Real Estate JSC, which Hamas tried to sell in 2019 for 150 million dollars.
“The United States has a long history of sanctioning innocent people without concrete evidence,” complains Ali Bakir, a Turkey expert and professor at Qatar University, for whom these accusations are part of a campaign aimed at countering the allegations Countering “genocide” Israel: “Some circles in Washington are trying to blackmail countries that defend the Palestinians, such as Turkey.”
The company that has raised the most dust after being chosen by Washington is the Turkish company Trend GYO, a listed company that recently completed the construction of the new building of the University of Commerce, an institution affiliated with the Istanbul Chamber of Commerce. The Turkish company was founded in 2006 by Qafisheh and Saudi national Saleh Mangoush under the name Anda Gayrimenkul, which changed to Trend GYO in 2017. Back in May 2022, the US Treasury Department added it to its sanctions list, identifying it as one of the “key components of Hamas’ global asset pool,” and several managers and shareholders have since been subjected to three additional rounds of sanctions.
“It's actually not hard for Hamas to do these things,” Levitt explains: “All they need is people who don't walk around in Hamas uniforms and are willing to run a company and, if it pays dividends “To divert some or all of them to Hamas.” On paper everything works as it should, in fact it is subject to independent audits and controls by the Turkish Securities Market Commission. So much so that, according to a New York Times investigation, international clients have purchased Trend GYO shares through American and European banks, including the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Ironies of global capitalism.
Turkey's finance ministry said last month it had reviewed the accounts of Trend GYO and people associated with it and concluded they “did not abuse the Turkish financial system” and that this was in no way related to the attacks on Israel on March 7 October is related. In statements to EL PAÍS, a company source described the US Treasury's allegations as “lies”: “We have no idea why they are attacking us; maybe because our first investors were Palestinians, but they left long ago and left Turkey. The current management doesn’t even know her personally.”
According to the commercial register, there has been a constant renewal of the board and shareholders over the last three years, with the majority of Arab investors leaving. Several officials affiliated with the AKP, the party of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, have replaced them and despite the sanctions, the construction company's shares have risen in value.
Amer Alsshawa, one of the alleged Hamas financiers for whom the US is offering a $10 million reward and who was arrested in the United Arab Emirates in 2015 on suspicion of supporting the Palestinian organization, served as Trend GYO's general director from 2007 and 2019. In an interview with The New York Times, he denied having ties to Hamas, but claimed to have suspicions that the council's members were actually working with the group: “I didn't really care, I was there to To earn money.” “
The dividends donated by the international investment group to Hamas are estimated to be between $10 million and $20 million per year. “These investments are not liquid. “It’s not cash that you can access immediately,” emphasizes Levitt. Rather, its importance lies in the fact that it is a fund that can be drawn upon in times of need. For example, accounting records obtained by Israeli espionage revealed that Hamas sold $75 million worth of assets after the 2014 war to rebuild some of its infrastructure in Gaza.
Now, after the destruction of the Gaza Strip, the foundation stone for the reconstitution of the Islamist group could also be laid there. “These investments generate ongoing returns, and unless they are identified and frozen, they will continue to do so.” But given the countries they are in, they are unlikely to be frozen,” says expert Jessica Davis for financial information and former Canadian intelligence officer: “If the group loses control of Gaza, almost all of its assets will be lost.” They can be used for military or terrorist activities.”
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