Five members of a U.S.-based Muslim charity, including a New Jersey man, were arrested yesterday for allegedly raising millions in “blood money” for Mideast terrorists.
Two other members of the Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development were described as wanted fugitives in a 42-count federal indictment.
Investigators said that from 1995 to 2001, the Texas-based group steered more than $12 million to Hamas, a Palestinian militant group notorious for its homicide bombings.
“Today, a U.S.-based charity that claims to do good works is charged with funding the works of evil,” Attorney General John Ashcroft said in Washington.
He called the funds raised by the group “blood money.”
The foundation, which once boasted it was the largest Muslim charity in America, was shut down by the Bush administration in December 2001 and its branches, including one in Paterson, N.J., were closed.
Early yesterday Abdulraham Odeh, the group’s New Jersey director, was arrested at his Paterson home, authorities said.
Odeh was ordered held after a brief appearance in Newark federal court.
The indictment, handed up in Dallas, was unsealed yesterday, a day after Holy Land filed a complaint alleging the FBI had “fabricated” a case against the group that led the Bush administration to freeze its assets of $4 million in 2001.
It also comes a month after Holy Land’s chairman, Ghassan Elashi, and four of his brothers were convicted in Dallas of illegally selling computers to Libya and Syria.
The new indictment alleges that Holy Land sent money raised in the United States to groups and people controlled by Hamas, and covered its activities by providing “minimal support” to legitimate charities.
With Post Wire Services
Un-holy business
Bio on the Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development:
Founded: 1987 in Los Angeles as Occupied Land Fund
Offices: Headquartered in Richardson, Texas, near Dallas, with branches in Paterson, N.J., San Diego and Bridgewater, Ill.
Charges: Conspiracy, providing support to terrorist organization, money laundering and tax evasion
Finances: Raised $13 million in 2000, but assets were frozen in December 2001.