Charity, ties to terror to be tackled in trial

The Baltimore Sun

DALLAS -- The strained argument between the U.S. government and nonprofit groups over how to deal with charities suspected of supporting terrorism is expected to play out in federal court here with the trial of the largest Muslim charity in America, the Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development.

Jury selection in the trial began yesterday, and was expected to take most of the week.

The government, in the lengthy indictment and other court documents, accuses the foundation of being an integral part of Hamas, which much of the West condemns as a terrorist organization. The prosecution maintains that the main officers of the Holy Land Foundation started the organization to generate charitable donations from the United States that ultimately helped Hamas thrive.

The defense argues that the government, lacking proof, has simply conjured up a vast conspiracy by claiming that Holy Land channeled money through public charity committees in the occupied territories that it knew Hamas controlled. The federal government, the defense says, has never designated these committees as terrorist organizations.

The defense is expected to liken a donation to Home Land to one to a Roman Catholic charity in Northern Ireland that ends up helping poor Irish Republican Army sympathizers.

The case is being closely watched by a large number of charitable organizations, as well as Muslim-Americans, because its outcome might well help determine the line separating legitimate giving from the financing of banned organizations.

Critics of government policy say the Office of Terrorism and Financial Intelligence at the Treasury Department has gone too far in using often secret evidence to condemn charities. The process unfairly destroys them, the critics say, though not one U.S. charity itself has been convicted of supporting terrorism since the practice started in 2001. Some individual officers have gone to jail.

These critics say that in its zeal to prosecute, the government has lost sight of the charities' delivery of millions to the poor and victims of disasters.

They also say that undermining charities on little or no public evidence tarnishes America's reputation among Muslims globally, effectively helping the very groups the policy is supposed to subvert.

"The Treasury Department has this 'complete taint' theory," said Kay Guinane of OMB Watch, a Washington group that advocates government transparency. If anyone in a charity is suspected of aiding a terrorist organization, Guinane said, the entire charity is deemed guilty.

Other countries, like England, have allowed charities under suspicion to continue to get aid to the poor, she said, whereas the Treasury Department "disagrees with any approach that says you can separate the real charitable work from the alleged terrorist activity."

Chip Poncy, the strategic policy director for the Treasury Department's terrorism finance office, outlined the department's approach in Congress in May. "If any aspect of a charity's organization is engaged in terrorist support, then the charitable organization is a problem," Poncy said.

But he also noted that all 44 charities the government has designated as supporting terrorism were engaged in some legitimate charity work. They include six organizations either closed or under investigation in the United States.

The Treasury Department refuses to reveal how many millions of dollars donated for the poor or disaster relief sit frozen in shuttered charities' accounts. But OMB Watch estimates the sum at $14 million, and lawyers for Holy Land say it includes its assets and charitable donations of about $5 million.

Copyright © 2021, The Baltimore Sun, a Baltimore Sun Media Group publication | Place an Ad
70°