A federal judge, rejecting the Trump administration’s position, has dismissed a lawsuit accusing a United Nations agency of providing more than $1 billion that enabled Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel.
In a ruling this week, the judge, Analisa Torres of Federal District Court in Manhattan, said the organization, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, was protected because it was part of the United Nations, which enjoys immunity from such lawsuits.
The lawsuit claimed that the agency, known as UNRWA, allowed Hamas to siphon off the agency’s funds to help construct a terrorist infrastructure that included tunneling equipment and weapons to support the attack, in which about 1,200 people were killed and roughly 250 were taken hostage.
The Biden administration had argued in court papers last year that UNRWA was protected by immunity and could not be sued. But in April, the Trump administration told the judge that neither UNRWA nor several of its officials named in the lawsuit, including Commissioner-General Philippe Lazzarini, were entitled to immunity.
“The complaint in this case alleges atrocious conduct on the part of UNRWA and its officers,” the Trump Justice Department wrote in a letter to Judge Torres, adding, “The government believes they must answer these allegations in American courts.”
“The prior administration’s view that they do not was wrong,” the Justice Department said.
The lawsuit against UNRWA, which sought unspecified damages, was brought on behalf of about 100 Israeli plaintiffs, including survivors of the attack, the estates of some of the people who were killed and at least one person whom Hamas held hostage in Gaza. The lawsuit says UNRWA and current and former officials of the agency aided and abetted Hamas in building up its terror infrastructure and the personnel necessary to carry out the Oct. 7 attack.
That help included “knowingly providing Hamas with the U.S. dollars in cash that it needed to pay smugglers for weapons, explosives and other terror materiel,” the suit said.
In the lawsuit, the plaintiffs described how they believed UNRWA funds ended up with Hamas, the Islamist group that has controlled Gaza for nearly two decades and has pledged to erase the Jewish state. Hamas has been designated a foreign terrorist organization by the United States.
The plaintiffs claimed, for example, that UNRWA deliberately paid local employees U.S. dollars in cash and required them to turn to money changers affiliated with Hamas for the local currency they needed to make purchases inside Gaza. That process “predictably” generated millions of dollars a month of additional income for Hamas, the lawsuit said.
On Thursday, a lawyer for the plaintiffs did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the judge’s ruling, nor did a spokeswoman for the relief agency.
Benjamin Weiser is a Times reporter covering the federal courts and U.S. attorney’s office in Manhattan, and the justice system more broadly.
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