Treasury Department designates anti-Israel group Samidoun as ‘sham charity’ with ties to terrorism

The Treasury Department announced on Tuesday that it had designated the radical anti-Israel group Samidoun as a "sham charity" operating as a key international fundraiser for the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine — which the U.S. has long identified as a foreign terrorist organization. The department's Office of Foreign Assets Control said that PFLP — which operates in the West Bank and Gaza — has used Samidoun as a front group in order to "maintain" its fundraising in Europe and North America. In addition to Samidoun, formally known as the Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network, the Treasury Department also said that it had added Khaled Barakat — an PFLP leader and Canadian citizen — to its list of specially designated nationals, noting that his "fundraising and recruitment efforts support the PFLP's terrorist activity against Israel." The action was announced in conjunction with Canada, which said on Tuesday it had designated Samidoun — based in Vancouver, British Columbia — as a "terrorist entity" under its criminal code. "Organizations like Samidoun masquerade as charitable actors that claim to provide humanitarian support to those in need, yet in reality divert funds for much-needed assistance to support terrorist groups," Bradley T. Smith, the acting undersecretary of the Treasury for terrorism and financial intelligence, said in a statement. The U.S. and its partners "will continue to disrupt those who seek to finance the PFLP, Hamas and other terrorist organizations," he added. The designation, which builds on recent Treasury efforts to target terror funding networks connected to Hamas, means that Samidoun's assets have been frozen, according to the announcement. Last week, the Dutch parliament voted to designate Samidoun as a terrorist organization, and the group was also banned by Germany in November 2023. In a statement on Tuesday, Gerald Steinberg, president of NGO Monitor, a Jerusalem-based research group that has long raised concerns over Samidoun, said the joint designation by the U.S. and Canada is a recognition of "the dangers of using NGO facades to support terror and mass murder like the Oct. 7 atrocities." "As NGO Monitor has documented, Samidoun is a major participant in campus-based mob violence across the U.S. and Canada, and there are a number of similar NGOs that need close examination," he said.