Canadian media is reporting that the national police have conducted search of a Canadian charity accused of sending money to Hamas. According to a National Post report:
IRFAN-Canada
April 29, 2014 TORONTO — The RCMP has conducted searches in Ontario and Quebec as part of an investigation into a Muslim relief organization that federal auditors accuse of sending almost $15-million to the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas.
Integrated National Security Enforcement Teams raided the head office of the International Relief Fund for the Afflicted and Needy — Canada in Mississauga, Ont. on Monday, as well as a private residence in Montreal.
‘An extensive amount of documentary evidence along with stored media, money and other records were seized,’ the RCMP said in a statement issued shortly after the government announced the former charity had been outlawed.
IRFAN-Canada lost its charity status in 2011 after an audit by the Canada Revenue Agency called the group an ‘integral part’ of an international fundraising effort that supported Hamas, the terrorist group that controls the Gaza Strip.
‘IRFAN-Canada has knowingly financed Hamas … for many years,’ Public Safety Minister Steven Blaney said Tuesday. ‘The well intentioned and charitable Canadians who sought to support humanitarian relief through this organization deserve better.’
A post from July 2013 reported that that IRFAN had suspended its operations after its bank accounts were closed. A post from April 2011 reported that the Canadian government had revoked IRFAN’s charity status over its funding of Hamas. Previous posts had reported on the suspension of IRFAN/Canada and discussed evidence of ties from IRFAN to Hamas fundraising that included:
A 2004 a report of the Israeli Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center, close to Israeli military intelligence, that described IRFAN/Canada as part of the worldwide Hamas fundraising network.
The the organization was one of the original members if the Union of Good, a coalition of Islamic charities that provides financial support to both the Hamas “social” infrastructure, as well as its terrorist activities and headed by global Muslim Brotherhood leader Youssef Qaradawi.
In May 2007, IRFAN/Canada was named by US prosecutors as part of the Global HAMAS financing mechanism in the Holy Land Terrorism terrorism financing trial.
