Israeli envoy in NY laments ‘strategic error’ of allowing Qatari cash transfers to Gaza
Ofir Akunis says funds ‘essentially gave Hamas the ability to build the tunnels,’ seeming to contradict Netanyahu’s claim that the money played no role in Oct. 7 onslaught
Add ToI as a Preferred Source on Google
Israel’s consul-general in New York said Saturday that the government’s yearslong policy of facilitating Qatari funds to Hamas-ruled Gaza was a “serious mistake” that enabled the Palestinian terror group to construct its tunnel network.
“It was a serious mistake, and it essentially gave Hamas the ability to build the tunnels with Qatari money,” Ofir Akunis, a longtime member of the ruling Likud party, told the Kan public broadcaster.
Akunis claimed that he told Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the time he opposed the policy, which was “not put to a government vote.”
Netanyahu publicly acknowledged responsibility and support for the Qatari cash transfers to Gaza at the time, saying they were necessary to prevent a humanitarian catastrophe there.
The envoy’s remarks contradicted Netanyahu consistent denials over the past two years that any of the money sent from Qatar to Gaza — which documents obtained by The Times of Israel earlier this year confirm Jerusalem both sought and valued — funded Hamas’s October 7, 2023, invasion of southern Israel.
At a press conference on the matter in May, Netanyahu said Hamas attacked wearing sandals, holding AK-47s, and riding pickup trucks, all of which are inexpensive, opposed to the advanced weaponry possessed by Israel, like F-35 stealth fighter jets or tanks.
He also said any tunnels Hamas might have built with the Qatari funds did not reach into Israel, thanks to an underground barrier he had ordered constructed.
The security barrier between Israel and Gaza, which included an underground wall and marine fortifications, failed to stop the Hamas-led onslaught, as thousands of terrorists bulldozed through the above-ground barrier, or bypassed it entirely with gliders or boats.
Documents seized in Gaza over the course of the war against Hamas and published by Channel 12 news in June show that Qatar’s payments to Hamas were significant enough that in December 2019, its then-politburo leader Ismail Haniyeh told Qatar’s Foreign Minister Mohammed bin Hamad Al Thani that the Gulf state’s cash transfers to Gaza were “Hamas’s main artery.”
Qatar’s role in supporting Hamas, beyond years of monthly cash grants, has become a major issue in Israel over the past year, with the questions compounded by an active criminal investigation into alleged illicit ties between Doha and some of Netanyahu’s top aides, who are suspected of spearheading a pro-Qatari public relations campaign following the October 7 attack despite the Gulf state’s strong ties to Hamas.
The Times of Israel Community.