The terror financing trial of the Arab Bank, based in Amman, Jordan, began yesterday in Federal District Court in Brooklyn.
The New York Daily News reports:
The plaintiffs suing Arab Bank for facilitating money transfers to charities controlled by Hamas and suicide bombers are 300 victims and family members of 24 terrorist attacks in Israel between March 2001 and September 2004.
“We intend to prove the bank knowingly provided financial services to senior Hamas leaders and operatives and to the families of suicide bombers,” said Gary Osen, attorney for the plaintiffs.
According to the report in The New York Times the case will revolve around how much officials of the bank knew that they were knowingly providing services to Hamas, a designated terror organization. For example Hamas spokesman Osama Hamdan maintained an account at the bank and ” at least three wire transfers” made to his account “were earmarked for Hamas” and were approved by officials at the bank.
The plaintiffs allege that charities like the Saudi Committee sent payments to terrorists and their families that the bank processed, pointing to a Saudi Committee spreadsheet that listed “the names of martyrs and their beneficiaries, as well as the martyrs’ causes of death,” according to an order from Judge Gershon.
The plaintiffs also have as evidence ads like one that ran in an Arab-language newspaper in 2002: “The relatives of the martyrs, whose names hereby follow, are requested to head for the Arab Bank branches in their places of residence in order to receive the tenth payment from the honorable Saudi Committee — a sum of 5,316.06 USD for each family.”
Payments of $5316.06 were typically made to families of “martyrs.”
In pre-trial proceedings the Arab Bank refused to turn over a number of documents demanded by the court leading Judge Nina Gershon to rule that she would instruct the jury that due to the refusal the jury “’may, but is not required to, infer’ that the bank provided financial services to designated terrorist organizations and individuals.”
Last month The New York Times reported on the dubious tricks major banks have used to continue doing business with Iran in violation of existing sanctions.
In his profile of Nitsana Darshan-Leitner, The Woman Who Makes the Jihadis Squirm that appeared in the February 2014 issue of The Tower Magazine, editor David Hazony explained the difficulty of suing banks for terror ties, “Yet the biggest challenge has clearly been fighting against corporations and banks. Suddenly you find yourself facing massive teams of well-heeled lawyers who have long ago mastered the tactics of high-stakes litigation on behalf of wealthy clients who exist only to preserve and build their wealth.”
[Photo: Producer / WikiCommons ]