A while back, we wrote that Hamas, the terrorists who managed to take over Gaza, was recently pleading for donations made in bitcoins. This had mostly to do with the fact that the United States had placed sanctions on Iran and prevented money from flowing into the country.
Recent news has revealed that Hamas has received bitcoin donations from several prominent crypto exchanges, according to the blockchain intelligence firm in Israel, Whitestream.
The military wing of Hamas, the Qassam Brigades, originally posited two bitcoin addresses on their official website on Thursday.
According to Whitestream, the first addresses received funds from a Coinbase wallet. In contrast, the second one seems unrelated to Coinbase, with Hamas planning to change their bitcoin address frequently. After publishing the address online for a few days, around $2,500 worth of bitcoin was donated. Blockchain data has revealed around 0.75 BTC was sent to the two addresses.
Additional donations have been made to Hamas with the use of Bittrex and a Russian exchange by the name of Vilkov, as well as from coinMixer.io mixing services, which try to obfuscate transactions.
Hamas has been designated a terrorist organization by the USA, the European Union, and Israel. Meaning if any citizens of these countries are caught funding this group, they will be harshly prosecuted by the state. In places like China, Russia, and Turkey, where Hamas hasn’t been labeled as a terrorist group, Citizens are free to send bitcoin donations without the worry of any repercussions.
Our Thoughts
Blockchain and bitcoins have been quite the wonder to behold in the past couple of years. Seeing the massive impact it’s had on people all over the world is quite fascinating for sure. Even so, it’s moments like these when bitcoin and cryptocurrency generally receive a nasty hit to their reputation for trying to develop for themselves as a form of legitimate form of payment that society should open up to. Bitcoins being used to fund terrorist organizations makes it really difficult to paint cryptocurrency in a positive light.
