From the Liveblog of
Tuesday, April 16, 2024
Corporations Authority to dissolve nonprofits associated with Ra’am party for alleged ties to terror
Sam Sokol is the Times of Israel's political correspondent. He was previously a reporter for the Jerusalem Post, Jewish Telegraphic Agency and Haaretz. He is the author of "Putin’s Hybrid War and the Jews"
The Corporations Authority announces the pending dissolution of two nonprofits associated with MK Mansour Abbas’ United Arab List party due to alleged terror ties.
According to a statement by the Justice Ministry, the decision came after an investigation found reason to believe that the Islamic Association for Orphans and the Needy and the Association for Humanitarian Actions had “transferred funds or cooperated with organizations outside of Israel that were declared as terrorist organizations.”
Both the United Arab List, also known by its Hebrew acronym Ra’am, and the nonprofits are affiliated with Israel’s Islamic Movement.
The two charitable funds were warned of the authority’s intent to begin liquidation procedures and given until May 6 to present their case as to why the government should not request a dissolution order from the court.
According to the Kan public broadcaster, Ra’am has claimed that the allegations constitute political persecution. Kan also reports that one of the two nonprofit accounts was recently blocked by Bank Leumi.
An attorney for the bank told the network that there had been “money transfers here to associations that we know are Hamas associations.”
Responding to the news, Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich writes on X, formerly Twitter, that he had “warned and cried out about the connection between the Ra’am party and Mansour Abbas and terrorism, a connection that today receives official confirmation.”
“We knew about it for sure and based our opposition to the establishment of a government that relies on them,” he states, referring to Ra’am’s presence in the short-lived Bennett-Lapid government.
