World Vision ‘shocked’ over staff member’s alleged links to Hamas

Israel on Tuesday said it indicted a Palestinian U.N. employee in the Gaza Strip, accusing him of assisting the territory’s Islamic militant Hamas rulers, just days after it charged the Gaza manager of the global charity World Vision for allegedly funneling millions to the group.

The Shin Bet on Thursday indicted Mohammed Halabi, head of World Vision’s Gaza program, for allegedly transferring some 7.2 million dollars from the worldwide charity organization to Hamas.

Waheed Borsh was arrested on 16 July by the Israel Police and Israel Security Agency (ISA) and indicted in a civilian court in southern Israel today (Tuesday, 9 August 2016). But Bursh’s relatives in Gaza insisted he was not involved with Hamas.

“This is not an isolated case, but rather a troubling trend of the systematic exploitation by Hamas terrorists of United Nations organizations”, the Israeli ambassador to the UN, Danny Danon, said in a separate statement.

Last week Israel charged a Gaza charity chief with diverting funds to Hamas. “The UNDP released a statement saying it was “greatly concerned by the allegation” against Al-Bursh”, and that it has “zero tolerance for wrongdoing in all of its programs and projects”. Active in Hamas for years, Boresh said under interrogation that he was instructed by Hamas to concentrate on his UNDP job in order to provide services for Hamas.

Israel said Waheed Borsh admitted to several charges including building a jetty with United Nations funds that was later used by Hamas’s navy.

The veteran aid worker said accounts of Hamas seizing aid are among the reasons for “stringent diversion policy”. Save the Children said they first learned of the allegations when contacted for comment by the media.

Mohammad Mahmoud, el-Halabi’s lawyer, told Al Jazeera that his client had been refused access to a lawyer for three weeks and claimed his interrogators “beat him a lot”.

World Vision said in a statement that its budgets are audited by professional and worldwide auditors. According to the Shin Bet, that amounts to about 60 percent of World Vision’s budget to Gaza.

No figures were provided on how much aid Borsh allegedly diverted and the charge sheet provided by the justice ministry did not say he joined Hamas.

“World Vision’s accountability processes cap the amount individuals in management positions at his level to a signing authority of $15,000”, said Keith Jenkins, president and CEO of World Vision.

Parts of Gaza were heavily damaged in the war between Hamas and Israel in 2014 and are still being rebuilt.

And in 2012, Richard Stearns, president of World Vision’s affiliate in the US, falsely accused Israel of denying Palestinian Christians the ability to attend Easter services in Jerusalem, stating that Israel only handed out 2,000-3,000 permits to these groups, when in fact it provided more than 20,000 permits.

According to World Vision, the charity’s total budget in Gaza in the last ten years totaled 22.5 million dollars, less than the sum that Israel alleged to be siphoned to Hamas.