The CEO of Binance, Richard Teng, has responded to and refuted allegations that, at the behest of the Israeli military forces, the cryptocurrency exchange froze all of the Palestinians’ money.
Teng characterized the charges as “FUD”, which were made public on the social media X by Ray Youssef, the founder and CEO of the peer-to-peer bitcoin trading company NoOnes.
Teng made it clear that Binance had not blocked all Palestinian accounts, but rather a small subset of user accounts that were clearly linked to illegal activity. He highlighted the fact that, like other financial institutions, Binance complies with globally recognized anti-money laundering laws.
The dispute started when Youssef published an authentic Hebrew letter written by Paul Landes, the director of Israel’s National Bureau for Counter-Terror Financing. Youssef translated the letter, which is related to a seizure order that was issued on November 1, 2023.
It discusses money that was sent to many cryptocurrency wallets, some of which could be connected to Youssef’s network, from the Dubai Exchange Company in the Gaza Strip. In 2022, the Dubai Exchange Company received the designation of terrorist group. The wallets and receivers that are involved are not specified in the letter itself.
Although it might be difficult to pinpoint precise numbers and identify particular wallets, the use of cryptocurrency in terror funding is a known problem. Even if traditional cash and unofficial value transfer methods are still more common, Singaporean officials warned in July that there has been an upsurge in the use of cryptocurrencies for financing terrorism.
Israel has previously seized Binance accounts linked to terrorism, including 190 accounts since 2021. Following the October 7, 2023, attack on Israel by Hamas, which resulted in significant casualties and hostages, Israeli authorities took additional measures.
On October 10, Israeli police requested the freezing of more accounts tied to Hamas. Later that month, the U.S. imposed sanctions on entities involved in money transfers and digital asset exchanges in Gaza, targeting organizations and businesses associated with Hamas.
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