WASHINGTON – Case files of U.S. Justice and Treasury Department refusals to investigate money laundering allegations since the year 2005 are now online at: //www.IRmep.org/ila/moneylaunder

An Israeli man walks in Ma’ale settlement near the West Bank city of Ramallah September 14, 2008. REUTERS/Gil Cohen Magen

On March 3, 2005, the former head of the State Prosecution Criminal Department Talia Sasson released an Israeli government commissioned report detailing a massive money laundering scheme. According to Sasson’s report, quasi governmental bodies and global nonprofit corporations were raising and diverting billions of dollars to establish West Bank colonies that are illegal under both Israeli and international law.

On March 18, 2005, the Jewish Daily Forward reported that U.S. nonprofit organizations such as Hadassah and B’nai B’rith controlled corporations implicated in the criminal activity. On May 5, 2005, University of Chicago researcher Robert Pape compiled an unparalleled database of suicide terrorism attacks leading to stunning conclusions in the book “Dying to Win.” Pape’s quantitative analysis revealed the major motivations of suicide attacks (such as 9/11) are “to compel modern democracies to withdraw military forces from territory that the terrorists consider to be their homeland.” Sasson’s report detailed how money laundering from the U.S. funded incremental land seizures and para-military occupation fueling just such a catalyst for global terrorism.

The August 14, 2005, USA Today article “No one knows the full costs of Israel’s settlement ambitions,” estimated the upper limit of the money laundering at $60 billion, and questioned how the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) covertly lobbied to preempt offsetting cuts in U.S. foreign aid to Israel.

On November 21, 2005, U.S. Department of Justice officials convened in the Russell Senate Office building for a presentation about this indirect terrorism generator and how U.S. nonprofit money laundering could be stopped under existing criminal statutes.

However, since 2005 the leadership of the U.S. Treasury Department’s Internal Revenue Service and Terrorism and Financial Intelligence units have repeatedly rebuffed requests for investigation and related inquiries. For three years the Department of Justice Counterterrorism Section, Federal Bureau of Investigation, and New York based U.S. Attorneys have formally refused to show investigatory interest in these publicly substantiated money laundering allegations.

A chronology of law enforcement agency correspondence and agency refusals related to the money laundering threat may now be consulted online at: //www.IRmep.org/ila/moneylaunder

The Institute for Research Middle Eastern Policy (IRmep) is a Washington-based nonprofit organization studying U.S.-Middle East policy formulation.