In
a letter sent on Tuesday to the U.S. Treasury Department and the
White House led by Senators Elizabeth Warren, Roger Marshall and
Representative Sean Casten, 105 lawmakers expressed “grave
concern” that Hamas and an affiliated group called Palestinian
Islamic Jihad were using digital assets to fund their operations
and evade U.S. sanctions.
“Congress and this administration must take strong action to
thoroughly address crypto illicit finance risks before it can be
used to finance another tragedy,” the letter said.
Israeli police said in an Oct. 10 statement that it had frozen
several crypto accounts that were used to solicit donations for
Hamas. Reuters reported in May that Israel had seized around 190
crypto accounts at crypto exchange Binance since 2021, including
dozens it said were owned by Palestinian firms connected to
Hamas.
Binance said the exchange had been "working closely with
international counter-terrorism authorities" on the seizures.
From its inception, the cryptocurrency community touted digital
assets as vehicles for anonymous transactions, and a slew of
federal enforcement actions for fraud, money laundering and
unregistered coin offerings has put the industry in the
spotlight.
Hamas uses a global financing network to funnel support from
charities and friendly nations, including by using
cryptocurrencies, Reuters reported on Monday.
Israeli authorities have seized “tens of millions of dollars” in
crypto from Hamas-linked addresses in recent years, according to
blockchain researchers TRM Labs.
The lawmakers requested that the Biden administration provide
estimates on the value of crypto assets that remain in
Hamas-controlled wallets, how much of Hamas’ operations are
funded through crypto, and any information it has on the actors
facilitating the sending of crypto to and from Hamas and other
militant groups.
(Reporting by Hannah Lang in Washington; editing by Michelle
Price and Bill Berkrot)
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