Israel’s Strategic Affairs Ministry said Monday that a two-year targeted campaign against the financial infrastructure of organizations that promote the anti-Semitic Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) campaign with links to terrorist groups resulted in the shut-down of dozens of fundraising accounts.
“For years, boycott promoters have disguised themselves as ‘human-rights activists,’ managing to raise tens of millions of euros from Western countries and citizens who thought they were contributing to causes supporting justice and equality,” said Strategic Affairs Minister Gilad Erdan in a statement.
“Over time, however, we have revealed that the supposed ‘human-rights’ NGOs are actually filled with anti-Semitic operatives with deep ties to terrorist groups fixated on destroying the State of Israel,” Erdan added.
The effort shuttered ten accounts based in the United States and 20 in Europe, the ministry said. The accounts were hosted on platforms like PayPal and DonorBox.
A report released in February by the Israeli Ministry of Strategic Affairs revealed over 100 alleged links between BDS groups and terrorism, particularly the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) and Hamas.
“As a result of our actions, countries and financial institutions are now distancing themselves from these organizations. Our efforts have drastically undermined the boycott campaign, leading to it having much less finances to operate, and barred from receiving financial services,” Erdan noted.
In April, several global payment providers cut ties with the BDS organization Samidoun over its alleged links to PFLP. Samidoun made headlines when the group invited a convicted terrorist, Rasmeah Odeh, to speak at an event in Germany in support of BDS. Berlin’s Foreign Nationals Office eventually revoked Odeh’s visa on the grounds that it would threaten public order, and she was forced to leave the country.
Odeh was convicted of a 1969 Jerusalem bombing that killed two Jewish students, Leon Kanner and Eddie Joffe. She was convicted in 2017 of immigration fraud and was deported from the United States to Jordan last year.
[Photo: Palestine Solidarity Campaign / Flickr]