One of the risks of crypto is the funding of terrorists. This is why legitimate financial institutions properly follow KYC/FACTA regulations. Binance was/is an organization pretty much dedicated to funding illegal activity. October 7 victims sue Binance for facilitating Hamas, Islamic Jihad funding Cryptocurrency company Binance is being sued for knowingly providing material support and resources to the two US-designated foreign terrorist organizations. https://www.jpost.com/diaspora/antisemitism/article-789464 Cryptocurrency platform Binance has been sued by victims of the October 7 massacre for facilitating Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad funding and financial transactions, according to a filing to the District Court for the Middle District of Alabama Northern Division on Monday. The nine plaintiffs sought damages from Binance, its affiliates, subsidiaries, and CEO Changpeng Zhao under the Antiterrorism Act and Alien Tort Statute for aiding, abetting, and knowingly providing material support and resources to the two US-designated Foreign Terrorist Organizations. The largest virtual currency exchange “knowingly and intentionally provided material support to Hamas and other vile terrorist organizations by facilitating their movement of funds,” said David Schoen, the lead attorney for the plaintiffs. Binance “used sophisticated manipulations to conceal the terrorists’ transactions,” he said. “Our federal government secured criminal convictions for the company and its CEO, but now Binance must be held directly accountable to its victims.” Binance financial settlement Last November, Binance settled with the US Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN), the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), and an IRS criminal investigation for violations of US anti-money-laundering laws and sanctions. In what the US Treasury called the largest settlement in history, Binance would have to pay penalties of $3.4 billion to FinCEN and $968 million to OFAC for failing to prevent and report suspicious transactions with terrorist organizations, including Hamas’s Izzadin al-Qassam Brigades, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, al-Qaeda, and the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) and facilitating cryptocurrency trades between US users and Iran, North Korea, Syria, and the Crimea region of Ukraine. “Binance turned a blind eye to its legal obligations in the pursuit of profit,” Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said in November. “Its willful failures allowed money to flow to terrorists, cyber-criminals, and child abusers through its platform.” According to a 2021 Coindesk analysis, Hamas received up to $100,000 in bitcoin since the beginning of 2021, and the transactions increased during May’s Operation Guardian of the Walls. Further attacks against Binance Ben Schlager, senior counsel at Goldfeder & Terry, said: “Illicit remittances knowingly facilitated by Binance provided the necessary material support, military and tactical enablement and acquisition capacity necessary for Hamas to train for and to carry out terrorist activities, including the complex, multi-pronged and highly sophisticated attack against civilians in Israel on October 7.” Arsen Ostrovsky, attorney and CEO of the International Legal Forum, which is working with the National Jewish Advocacy Center to aid the victims in the case, said Binance’s platform had helped the terrorist organizations fund-raise for atrocities. American-Israeli plaintiff Noach Newman’s brother was killed during the Hamas attack on the Supernova music festival, an event that several other plaintiffs, including American David Bromberg, survived and were seeking damages for the suffering and trauma that they endured. Israeli Lishay Lavi’s husband, Omri Miran, was kidnapped at the couple’s Nahal Oz home. Other plaintiffs, including Hagar Almog, were forced to evacuate and had their lives upended by the pogrom.
There's a book called Harpoon that goes into detail regarding Israeli operations to target terrorist financing. The basic MO is: 1 Identify source of funding by any means necessary 2 sue in the US to confiscate assets One of the interesting aspects of Bitcoin is that it makes it easier to identify the last hop in transferring money to banned organizations. No need to compromise a bank employee to get the records.
What happens if the funds are traced directly to Qatar...do we sue Qatar? Maybe some of the funds are linked directly to Jordan? Qatar and Jordan are two of our last safe military bases in west asia. Maybe someone used accomplices in egypt. Silppery slope. How do we collect the lawsuit award? Can we freeze bank accounts in Qatar banks? Should we freeze Qatar funds located in the US? https://www.lemonde.fr/en/economy/a...on-qatar-for-its-gas-supplies_6008665_19.html https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al_Udeid_Air_Base Did the money come from Qatar. Very high chance that it indeed did.
Meanwhile, US Gov maintains aid despite clear Leahy law violations. I think supreme court already ruled that 9/11 victims could not sue the Saudis
If Israel gets specific actionable Intel, I doubt they will sit on it. They might sue or they might do something else. For a historical example: " He connected Hamas with the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, Qatar and the various Gulf Arab states – and sources of money generally. The celebration was interrupted by an Israel Air Force AH-64D Longbow attack helicopter that, with the push of a button, sent a single AGM-114 Hellfire antitank missile slamming into Ghoul’s Chinese-made car. “The sedan evaporated into a fireball and a cloud of black smoke... the skies turned green as a storm of singed $100 bills cascaded onto the dusty streets of Gaza City.... The payroll’s incineration was a major blow to Hamas. Without the cash they could not maintain the struggle. Hamas asked for a cease-fire,” says the book. The Gaza war ended 48 hours later. " https://m.jpost.com/Israel-News/Ope...NGO-destroyed-terrorist-money-networks-513622 Facilitating terror financing is a risky business.
Starving and humiliating people, treating them like cornered cockroaches, works wonders. More Oct 7ths likely to continue to happen until ....
...the whole region is glassed sadly. Pushing pissed off Muslims out of their homes and into Lebanon did not make Israel's problems disappear back in the 80's. Pushing them into Egypt won't work either. You take away someone's everything, they'll resist with nothing to lose. You try to make the problem another country's policing problem, don't act surprised if said government starts opposing you either.
I do believe that Qatar will be brought into the conflict against Israel. Not sure if will be military or financial. I just hope that our bases would stay safe in that country. If Israel turns toward financial warfare against Qatar...and starts a cease fire against Palestine..it would be a very very positive step. It would also stop the military money flow into Palestine.