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Wednesday, Dec. 5, 2001

"The message is this: Those who do business with terror will do no business with the United States, or anywhere else the United States can reach," said Bush.

The president made his remarks in the White House Rose Garden accompanied by Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill and Attorney General John Ashcroft.

His comments came after Israel launched strikes against targets in Palestinian-controlled areas Monday in retaliation for a weekend-long wave of suicide bombings and other attacks by Hamas in Haifa, Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip that killed more than two dozen people.

"Hamas is an extremist group that calls for the total destruction of the state of Israel. It is one of the deadliest terrorist organizations in the world today," Bush said. "Hamas openly claimed responsibility for this past weekend's suicide attacks in Israel that killed 25 innocent people, many of them teenagers, and wounded almost 200 other people.

"Hamas is guilty of hundreds of other deaths over the years, and just in the past 12 months, it killed two Americans. And today we act."

As part of its crackdown on Hamas, the Department of Treasury shut three Richardson, Texas, organizations it said raised money for the group. Federal authorities raided the offices of Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development and two financial institutions, al Aqsa bank and Beit al Mal bank.

At the same time, authorities blocked the accounts of a bank and a company, both based in the West Bank, they said were linked to Hamas.

O'Neill called the organizations "direct arms of Hamas established and used to do Hamas business."

Holy Land Foundation, which raised $13 million last year, calls itself the largest Muslim charity in the United States. It has offices in Texas, California, New Jersey and Illinois.

"Innocent donors who thought they were helping someone in need deserve protection from these scam artists who prey on their benevolence," O'Neill said.

Ashcroft said the foundation shared employees and office space with Infocom, an Internet company. Ashcroft said Infocom was raided by the FBI and had its assets frozen by federal authorities six days before the Sept. 11 attacks. Infocom, he said, received much of its money from Mousa Abu Marzook, a top Hamas official who the U.S. courts have determined to be directly involved in terrorism.

The foundation's Web site, which was still operational after Bush's announcement, described the group's mission as "focusing on Palestinian refugees in Jordan, Lebanon, and Palestine" with "the elemental precepts of humanity where by all people are created equal and poses certain inalienable rights."

The foundation issued a statement that said, ``The decision by the U.S. government to seize the charitable donations of Muslims during the holy month of Ramadan is an affront to millions of Muslim Americans who entrust charities like ours to assist in fulfilling their religious obligations.''

O'Neil said: "This is not a case of one bad actor stealing from the petty-cash drawer and giving the stolen money to terrorists. This organization exists to raise money in the United States to promote terror."

Since the Sept. 11 attacks, the Bush administration has targeted the financial assets of organizations with links to extremist organization as part of its global war against terrorism.

Bush signed an executive order Sept. 23 directing the Treasury Department to freeze the assets of groups whose activities could be traced to Afghanistan's then-ruling Taliban, Saudi terrorism suspect Osama bin Laden and his al-Qaeda organization, as well as other groups sponsoring terrorist activities. Since then, the United States has frozen $61 million in financial assets linked to the al Qaida network.

A Treasury Department task force, which includes investigators from FBI, CIA and Department of Justice, has been working to track the financial activity of groups with possible terrorist ties operating in the United States. In October, Treasury officials expanded their list to include organizations with associations in the Middle East.

Ashcroft said that by freezing the financial apparatus of Hamas, it sends a signal the United States would not be used "as a staging ground for the financing of those groups that violently oppose peace as a solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict."

Copyright 2001 by United Press International.

All rights reserved.

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