Dozens of families of victims of Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, attack against Israel are suing cryptocurrency exchange Binance for allegedly facilitating payments to terrorist groups.
In a lawsuit filed on Monday in the U.S. District Court for the District of North Dakota, the victims described Binance as intentionally designed to operate as a “criminal enterprise to facilitate money laundering on a global scale.” One of two defendants, Binance founder Changpeng Zhao, was pardoned by President Donald Trump a month ago, putting him in an awkward position.
“Years before October 7, Binance knew that Hamas, the [Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps of Iran], Hezbollah, [Palestinian Islamic Jihad], and other terrorist organizations were all transacting regularly on its platform and nevertheless actively assisted their use of the platform,” the lawsuit read.
“It did so at a time when Hamas, in particular, was publicly directing its donors to send funds to so-called ‘crypto wallets’ held with Binance,” they alleged.
The plaintiffs allege that Binance purposefully manipulated how transactions to terrorist groups were filed, instead of the legally required suspicious activity reports.
“Binance not only knowingly provided financial services to Hamas; it actively tried to shield its Hamas customers and their funds from scrutiny by U.S. regulators or law enforcement—a practice that continues to this day,” according to the lawsuit.
Since the Oct. 7 attacks, the crypto exchange “knowingly facilitated the equivalent of more than $50 million U.S. dollars in transactions … for Hamas, the IRGC, Hezbollah, and PIJ on public blockchains,” the lawsuit claimed.
TRUMP PARDONS CHANGPENG ZHAO, BINANCE FOUNDER CONVICTED UNDER BIDEN
In a statement to CNBC, Binance claimed it complies with international sanctions laws and has “executed a wide-ranging transformation” of its sanctions framework over the past few years.
The lawsuit pits different parts of Trump’s coalition against each other, primarily his new crypto supporters who began their support in force last election, and anti-terrorism hawks. Trump pardoned Zhao earlier this month on grounds that he was unjustifiably prosecuted by the Biden administration in its war on cryptocurrency, but when pressed later, claimed to know nothing about Zhao.