CRYPTOCURRENCY & TERRORISMCryptocurrency Tech Firm Blocks Terrorists’ Access to Cash
Could Israel eradicate Hamas and other terrorist networks without a single person killed and without any boots on the ground or planes in the sky? For one technology firm, fighting terror doesn’t involve killing people, only killing the transfer of funds.
Could Israel eradicate Hamas and other terrorist networks without a single person killed and without any boots on the ground or planes in the sky?
That was what the Israeli Ministry of Defense wanted to know when it contacted Lionsgate Network, a 13-person Israeli startup that helps individuals and private investors recover money from their hacked or scammed cryptocurrency wallets.
Could Lionsgate Network apply its knowhow to blocking the terrorists’ access to their virtual cash? After all, even terrorists need money to buy more rockets or fuel to power their extensive network of underground tunnels.
“If you want to hit terror, you need to cut off their stream of capital,” Bezalel Raviv, CEO of Lionsgate Network, tells ISRAEL21c. “You don’t have to kill people to get it done. You just need to kill the transfer of funds.”
Kidnapping Yields a Jackpot
Those funds are not just about acquiring more projectiles or moles for digging underground tunnels.
“Reports indicate that, if a Gazan citizen kidnaps an Israeli, they stand to receive compensation of $1.2 million from Hamas,” Raviv says.
“Given the oppressive economy in Gaza, where a full day of labor is valued at only $13, it would take an average Gazan 352 years to earn that amount. Kidnapping an Israeli is like winning the jackpot. Having pushed Gaza into poverty, Hamas has shifted its focus from the previous religious rhetoric of 72 virgins in paradise to a purely greed-driven agenda.”
That is, the 72 virgins promised to Muslim martyrs are no longer the main story because Hamas recruits need money here and now, not in the next lifetime.
Hamas has, as is now well-known, been receiving payment for its “activities,” initially from Qatar, which sent cash stuffed in leather suitcases with Israeli permission.
As Gaza’s borders closed due to the ongoing conflict, Hamas diversified its funding sources, turning to cryptocurrencies.
“If Israel had proactively blocked Hamas’s crypto-wallets before October 7, the war might have concluded by now,” Raviv speculates.
Iran is Bankrolling Hamas
Iran contributes roughly $100 million a year to Hamas via crypto-exchanges.
“The entire amount of money in the world today stands at around $83 trillion,” Raviv says, with crypto transactions representing about $1.4 trillion – “1.5% of that big pile.”
A chunk of this, Raviv adds – possibly tens of billions of dollars – “is with leaders of groups such as Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad and Hamas – all in the crypto game.”
