Exposed: Islamic Party Ra’am Collaborates with Hamas Group in Turkey

An investigation by HaKol Ha’Yehudi’s reporter Elchanan Groner has revealed that the Ra’am party and its flagship association, Aid 48, are neck-deep in ties with the Hamas-affiliated Turkish association Khyar Ommah, and are inciting terrorism in a summer camp operated by Ra’am members and the Islamic movement.

According to Israeli prosecutors, Aid 48 senior officials who are close to Ra’am Chairman MK Mansour Abbas, worked closely with Hamas operatives, including one operative who tried to guide an attack on an Elbit security plant.

The affair was revealed in a February 11 indictment against Rami Habibullah, a teacher from the village of Ein Mahal in Galilee. According to the indictment, following the start of the fighting in the Gaza Strip, Habibullah offered Hamas operatives abroad his services in promoting terrorist activities in Israel. He sent a Hamas operative a photo of a security plant in his area of residence, with its exact location, to help Hamas fire rockets at this plant (Shin Bet Arrests Arab Teacher Who Directed Hamas Rockets to Hit Security Plant near his Home).

According to the indictment, Habibullah also transferred large sums of money to Khyar Ommah in Turkey, contacted Hamas operatives Abdel Jaber Shelbi and Ibrahim Alnaji from Khyar Ommah, and reported the location of the Elbit plant near Nof HaGalil, so Hamas would target it with missiles.

KHYAR OMMAH

Alnaji, a Hamas activist and a key employee of the Khyar Ommah association passed on the information to other Hamas members and finally informed Rami that Hamas could not at the moment bomb the factory. Instead, he asked Rami to “take the initiative” and carry out an attack himself against the Elbit factory. Rami, for his part, recruited more Arabs in an effort to acquire weapons for the mission. He also planned a shooting attack in Jerusalem.

The HaKol HaYehudi investigation revealed that the Khyar Ommah association, which the indictment suggests belongs to Hamas, has a close relationship with Aid 48, a.k.a. the Islamic association for orphans and the needy, which is the flagship association of Ra’am and the southern Islamic movement – both controlled by MK Mansour Abbas.

In response to the HaKol HaYehudi exposé, Ra’am stated in public announcements and in mainstream media interviews that they had no idea the Turkish association was connected to Hamas and claimed that they carefully checked the defense ministry record and found no reference to Khyar Ommah being banned for security reasons.

However, the HaKol HaYehudi investigation reveals that these are blatant lies and there is no way the Ra’am officials didn’t know that Khyar Ommah’s staff were Hamas operatives.

SUMMER CAMP

The Ra’am-Aid 48 summer camp appearance of a Hamas sheik in 2017 posted on Khyar Ommah’s Facebook. / Screenshot courtesy of HaKol HaYehudi

And then there was the “educational” content, rife with incitement to terrorism, that the senior Ra’am officials, led by Nasiba Issa, a member of the Shura Council, which was taught to children in the summer camp they conducted together with the Turkish association.

In the certificate awards ceremony at the end of that summer camp, Nasiba Issa, the wife of Aid 48 senior official Na’il Issa, a local sheik was asked to give a speech to the children and their counselors. Here’s what he said:

“The hope of this nation is to return to blessed Jerusalem with the flags of Islam and with the guns. Because the enemies don’t know the language of roses, only the language of guns… The future is Al-Aqsa and not the deal of the century! The future is the tunnels of Gaza and not the tunnels of Oslo! The future is of the great march of return in the land of Gaza and not of the marches of repression and humiliation.”

At the end of his speech, the sheik declares: “The Koran is our constitution and Al-Aqsa is our original direction of prayer, jihad is our way, and death for Allah is our soul’s desire.”

Applause everywhere.

The program during that ceremony includes the inevitable songs of Jew-hatred and dreams of the violent liberation of “occupied Palestine.”

IHH

Khyar Ommah’s website reveals the group’s partners, most notably IHH, an Islamist Turkish group affiliated with Al Qaeda and Hamas, which was ruled to be a terrorist organization by a US court in Virginia. Since 2008, IHH has been on the terror watch list, and in 2010 it participated in the Marmara flotilla from Turkey to Gaza.

Until his death from Corona, IHH employed Hossein Aouda, a Hamas terrorist who was expelled from Israel in 1993 by the Rabin government. In 2017, the Hamas sheik appeared in an image with pictures of Gilad Shalit and the logo of Khyar Ommah.

Hamas terrorist Hossein Aouda appeared in this image with pictures of Gilad Shalit and the logo of Khyar Ommah in 2017. / Screenshot courtesy of HaKol HaYehudi

Khyar Ommah’s founder and director is Abd al-Jabbar Shalabi who was known as the coordinator of Hamas activities in Latakia in northwestern Syria while working as a teacher for UNRWA. The Syrians jailed him several times until he finally moved to Turkey.

Ibrahim Alnaji, who helped the Israeli Arab teacher’s attempt to sabotage the Elbit plant, can be clearly seen in a Zoom conversation between Hamas and Islamic Jihad representative. Alnaji worked at the Aid 48 summer camp that was run by Ra’am.

Hamas agent Ibrahim Alnaji appears in a Zoom shot with Hamas and Jihad members. / Screenshot courtesy of HaKol HaYehudi

SEE NO EVIL

In short, the Ra’am folks and their Aid 48 charity had to shut their eyes with great vigor to avoid recognizing Hamas’s involvement in every aspect of Khyar Ommah with which they have been cooperating since 2016, according to HaKol HaYehudi.

The Ra’am Facebook page fundraised on three separate occasions for Khyar Ommah in 2020.

In conclusion, Ra’am’s legal claim that they did not know they were dealing with a Hamas association can hardly hold water given the findings of the HaKol HaYehudi investigation.

Now it remains to be seen whether the AG, the prosecutor’s office, the Shin Bet, and the police will find ways to discredit the senior members of Ra’am and Aid 48.