We highly recommend you read this even if you already agree or don't particularly care about foreign policy, because it arms you with the facts to be able to convince others on this critical issue.

Elizabeth Warren says "Ban Crypto" to stop terrorism financing, but it’s Israel’s Netanyahu that funded Hamas:

https://SimplifiedPrivacy.com/BanBitcoin

Monero not mentioned, but that's keeping it out the public discussion on bans.

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[–] byte1000@discuss.tchncs.de 2 points 11 months ago (1 children)

I support the idea of the use of Monero as digital cash. So obviously I'm against the attempt to ban Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies.

English isn't my native language, but I find that your description of the Israel-Hamas situation is misleading. In the same article that you cite, it clearly says that Hamas received money from the Qatari government, that's where the suitcases full of cash came from. It was not Israeli money nor US tax payers' money. The ones funding terror are Qatar and Iran.

[–] SummerBreeze@monero.town 2 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) (1 children)

updated https://simplifiedprivacy.com/banbitcoin/

Quotes from the New York Times:

“Shlomo Brom, a retired general and former deputy to Israel’s national security adviser, said an empowered Hamas helped Mr. Netanyahu avoid negotiating over a Palestinian state.” [5]

As long as Hamas was in-charge of the Gaza Strip, Israel could say at the UN “look we have no partner for peace”. Then they’d avoid having to make land successions. The New York Times continues:

“Mr. Lieberman: “For Netanyahu, there is only one thing that is really important: to be in power at any cost,” he said. “To stay in power, he preferred to pay for tranquility.” Suitcases filled with cash soon began crossing the border into Gaza” [5]

The money flowed from Israel to Qatar to Hamas. The Israeli newspaper Haaretz covered this extensively: [11]

Military Intelligence Director Amos Yadlin commented on June 13, 2007 that “Israel would be happy if Hamas took over Gaza because the IDF could then deal with Gaza as a hostile state.” [11]

Then a different Haaretz article covering the Jerusalem Post’s coverage: [10]

According to the Jerusalem Post, in a private meeting with members of his Likud party on March 11, 2019, Netanyahu explained the reckless step as follows: The money transfer is part of the strategy to divide the Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank. [10] [8]

And further brought to our attention by Scott Horton [8]:

“In an interview with the Ynet news website on May 5, 2019, Netanyahu associate Gershon Hacohen, a major general in reserves, said, “We need to tell the truth. Netanyahu’s strategy is to prevent the option of two states, so he is turning Hamas into his closest partner. Openly Hamas is an enemy. Covertly, it’s an ally.” [10] [8]

And this same money was what enabled the terrorism attacks on Oct 7th and NOT Bitcoin as Elizabeth Warren will have you believe. As the New York Times confirms:

“Israeli intelligence officials now believe that the money had a role in the success of the Oct. 7 attacks, if only because the donations allowed Hamas to divert some of its own budget toward military operations.” [5]

These are only a few of the hundreds of quotes from Israeli newspapers and Israeli officials. Please see Scott Horton’s excellent write-up for even further information. [8] The amount of evidence is overwhelming including first hand quotes from Netanyahu himself. [12]

Sources: https://simplifiedprivacy.com/sourceswarrenbitcoin/

[–] byte1000@discuss.tchncs.de 1 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago)

I'm glad you've edited you're blog post so now the country of Qatar is mentioned, which was not the case before. At least there's some progress here.

But I believe that your description of the situation is currently still misleading, especially the title "Israel funded Hamas". Again, it might just be a language issue, but It seems like your claim is that Israel took money from its own budget, and gave it to Hamas (directly or indirectly). If that's actually you're claim, there's no source you've cited that actually says that. Is that your claim? Please correct me if I'm wrong.

It's hard for me to tell if you've actually addressed the point I was making, because all you did is adding quotations. So I don't know if you've accepted my correction that it was not Israeli money nor US tax payers’ money, but in fact was Qatari money, just as your sources say.

So to be clear, I'm not arguing about the fact that Netanyahu's strategy was to allow Qatari money to be handed to Hamas in Gaza, for the purpose of preventing peace talks with Fatah's Palestinian Authority. That is obviously true.

[11] Haaretz:

It’s important to remember that without those funds from Qatar (and Iran), Hamas would not have had the money to maintain its reign of terror, and its regime would have been dependent on restraint.

In practice, the injection of cash (as opposed to bank deposits, which are far more accountable) from Qatar, a practice that Netanyahu supported and approved, has served to strengthen the military arm of Hamas since 2012.