Cryptocurrency stolen from Delhi lands in Hamas wallets

NEW DELHI: Within the winter of 2021, Delhi Police‘s Particular Cell was investigating a case of cryptocurrency theft of round Rs 4 crore from the pockets of a west Delhi businessman. Although the cops managed to ‘deep hint’ just a few recipient pockets IDs, monitoring the top customers appeared troublesome. Simply on the time, Israel’s intelligence company, Mossad, communicated – as a part of routine intelligence alternate with their Indian counterparts – details about some suspect wallets operated by terrorist teams for terror funding.

Most of the pockets addresses on the listing have been being operated by the al Qassam brigades of Hamas, the Palestinian terror group, and had been ‘seized’ by Israel’s Nationwide Bureau for Counter Terror Financing
A breakthrough arrived when the Particular Cell’s Intelligence Fusion & Strategic Ops (IFSO) unit ran a match on the wallets: a number of wallets that had obtained the Bitcoin and Ethereum belongings from Delhi have been operated by the cyber terrorism wing of Hamas.
Whereas Israel has hit again strongly at Hamas for Saturday’s assault, sources stated the intelligence businesses have their antennae up about renewed efforts by the phobia outfit to gather funds by hacking in pro-Israel international locations.
Even on Tuesday, the cyber unit of Israel Police froze numerous cryptocurrency accounts held by Hamas for fundraising. Israel Police stated on X (previously Twitter) that Hamas had launched a crypto fundraising marketing campaign after the beginning of the most recent terror assaults. Israeli authorities additionally urged crypto alternate Binance to switch the seized funds to that nation’s state treasury.
The case in Delhi was the primary occasion of Hamas’ exercise in India. Particular Cell officers stated that the probe particulars have been communicated to the related authorities on the time. Former DCP (Particular Cell) KPS Malhotra’s workforce had investigated the case. “Sure, our investigation had led us to a number of wallets linked to the al Qassam brigades,” Malhotra confirmed on Tuesday.
The matter, cops stated, was first reported in 2019 at Paschim Vihar police station and the investigation was later transferred to the Particular Cell on courtroom orders, cops aware about the investigation recalled. After the Hamas hyperlink was unearthed, technical evaluation revealed that one of many seized wallets belonged to Naseer Ibrahim Abdulla in Gaza and to Hamas operatives like Ahmed Marzooq in Giza and Ahmed QH Safi in Ramallah in Palestine. “The cryptocurrencies have been routed by means of numerous personal wallets and at last landed in these suspected wallets,” a police officer revealed.