Aid organisation accused of funnelling money to terror group Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine in Gaza
Australians have been donating tens of thousands of dollars to an aid organisation in Gaza that’s been accused of funnelling the money to a hardline Islamic terrorist group.
Australians have been donating tens of thousands of dollars to an aid organisation in Gaza that’s been accused of funnelling the money to a hardline Islamic terrorist group.
Sky News can reveal the charity founded by the Australia Palestine Advocacy Network president Nasser Mashni is sending money to a Gaza-based health organisation that is accused of being affiliated with the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine terror group, known as the PFLP.
The PFLP, responsible for hijacking planes, assassinations and suicide bombings, is a designated terrorist organisation in the United States, the European Union and Canada, while Australia has the group on its consolidated list of organisations subject to financial sanctions.
NGO Monitor says the links between the PFLP and the aid organisation, the Union of Health Work Committees (UHWC), are so extensive that any funding supporting it is in violation of international terror financing laws and incompatible with human rights principles.
Israeli officials believe the UHWC is a front for the PFLP and declared it an illegal organisation in early 2020.
Mr Mashni is a founding and current board member of registered Australian charity “Olive Kids”, which claims to support Palestinian children and orphans.
One of the four partners it sends funds to is the UHWC, a non-government organisation that says it “provides health services in Gaza with focus on women and children”.
“Olive Kids collaborates with UHWC to facilitate annual Australian medical missions to operate Al Awda (hospital),” its website states.
Olive Kids specifies, in its 2020-21 annual report, that as part of their emergency appeal for Gaza, $30,000 was sent for urgent medical supplies and consumables for the UHWC Medical Centre and the Al-Awda Hospital.
Another $15,000 was given for fuel for generators for UHWC for critical energy shortages.
Olive Kids has been working with UHWC since at least 2014, according to its annual reports.
Its 2016 report said that “in collaboration with the Union of Health Work Committees (UHWC) Olive Kids facilitated an Australian medical mission to Al-Awda Hospital in Gaza.”
A January 2020 report by the Israel-based NGO Monitor, which has been set up to assess non-governmental organisations claiming to advance human rights, identifies extensive ties between UHWC and the PFLP terror group.
“UHWC’s terror affiliation is antithetical to human rights norms and principles,” it said.
“Due to its affiliation with the PFLP, the provision of funds to UHWC is in likely violation of international, EU and domestic terror financing and material support laws.
“The organisation is therefore an inappropriate partner for governments and individuals seeking to further human rights in the region.”
Israel declared the UHWC to be an illegal organisation in January 2020 and raided its headquarters in March the following year, seizing files, before arresting seven employees and affiliates by May.
The investigation alleged that UHWC was over-charging international donors for medical equipment, among other legitimate projects, and funnelling the remaining money to the PFLP.
Washington Institute fellow, Matthew Levitt, who is also the director of its counterterrorism and intelligence program, wrote a report in 2021 examining the evidence against NGOs like UHWC providing funding to the PFLP.
“According to the Israeli indictment of Tisir Abu Sharbak, one of the four UHWC employees arrested in May 2021, the NGOs in question employed a variety of money laundering schemes to obfuscate their role as PFLP fronts,” he wrote.
“First, they forged documents and receipts to significantly inflate the cost of a given project as presented to donors. The difference from these inflated invoices would go to the PFLP.
“The NGOs also presented foreign donors forged invoices for purchases that were either never made at all or made for a fraction of the stated cost.”
The UHWC is also alleged to have forged receipts for a project to supply medicines in East Jerusalem, claiming it would cost 2.4 million shekels, when it was only 100,000 shekels.
“The remaining funds were redirected to the PFLP,” Dr Levitt’s report states.
“In another case, Israeli authorities say evidence documents how the UHWC told donors a project to vaccinate Palestinian children would cost 245,000 euros, when the actual cost was a mere 2500 shekels (less than 700 euros) and most of the money was siphoned off for the PFLP.”
Dr Levitt concludes that the NGOs, including UHWC, “clearly do engage in civil society work and have partnered with the United Nations and human rights organisations for such work” but he also warns that at a minimum, “governments, civil society organisations and human rights groups need to address the evidence underlying the Israeli allegations to determine if the organisations with which they have been partnering to further human rights employ the same people who are criminally responsible for the PFLP attacks”.
Many employees at the UHWC are also members of the PFLP.
The history between UHWC and the PFLP dates to the charity’s very inception.
A USAID document, dated 1993, states that the UHWC is “the PFLP’s health organisation”.
“The PFLP’s health care network is co-ordinated by the Union of Health Work Committees (UHWC),” it states.
“As a significant provider of health care during the Intifada, the UHWC has an extended network of supporters and volunteers throughout the West Bank. Of all the factionalised health care committees, the UHWC has the greatest presence in the Gaza Strip.
“Thus far, the UHWC has been more successful than the (Union of Agricultural Works Committee - the PFLP’s agricultural organisation) at maintaining its ‘market share’ of development aid in the current posturing, although its prospects under most autonomy scenarios are not bright.”
The PFLP is responsible for the 2014 massacre in a Jerusalem synagogue where five people were killed, including three American rabbis and a policeman, a 2015 attack on Israelis driving a car, an assassination plot against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and a 2012 attack involving firing an antitank missile explosive device.
PFLP was also responsible for spate of suicide bombings in 2002 to 2004 which killed Israeli civilians, and the assassinations of Israeli minister for tourism Rahevam Zeevi and Israeli head of security Meir Lixenberg in 2001.
Its first major attack was in 1968 when it hijacked a commercial El Al Flight and held hostages captive for 40 days.
As Israel’s war in Hamas enters its second month, the international community has been eager to send humanitarian funds into Gaza, with Australia sending $25 million so far.
The Israeli Government has claimed international aid in the past has been exploited and misused to support terrorism, including financing Gaza’s network of underground tunnels and weapons.
Sky News asked Mr Mashni if he was aware of the connections between UHWC and the PFLP, how much money had been sent by Olive Kids to UHWC and whether he was concerned that money intended for Palestinian children could end up with a terror group.
He did not respond to the questions, but Olive Kids chairman, Amin Abbas, replied to say the organisation was raising funds in Australia “to support orphaned children in the occupied Palestinian territories”.
“Every cent raised in Australia goes directly to support these children in their health and education,” he said.
“Olive Kids is registered with the Australian Charities and Not-for-profits Commission. The charity operates, fundraises and distributes its revenue in full compliance with all ACNC conduct standards, and is financially audited annually, demonstrating transparency in both its fundraising and expenditure processes.”
The Sydney Morning Herald reported on Friday that Mr Mashni had advocated for the destruction of the Israeli state and claimed the world’s power structures “all focus upon Zionism”
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