Israeli police detained local officials and businesspeople on Monday as part of a fraud inquiry into allegations that wartime aid donated after the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas-led attack was diverted and pocketed, according to an Israeli police statement reported by the Associated Press.
The statement said investigators had tracked unnamed local leaders in the months leading up to the arrests. Police said the suspicions centered on an alleged diversion of the equivalent of millions of dollars that were sent in the context of the Israel-Hamas war, with investigators alleging that some funds did not reach the purposes described for them.
After the Oct. 7 attack, donations surged from synagogues, corporations and Jewish organizations around the world, with aid sent to Israeli charities and municipalities in need, AP reported. The detentions came as authorities sought to examine whether money raised and delivered for emergency services during the war was being handled as intended.
Israel’s Diaspora Affairs Ministry said in a March 2024 report that at least $1.4 billion had been donated by that point. The ministry report said local councils and associated municipal businesses “received a substantial amount” of the funds, particularly councils near the Gaza border, as local authorities worked alongside nonprofits worldwide to strengthen social services for evacuees.
AP reported that the prime minister’s office said more than 120,000 Israelis were displaced from communities near Gaza and along the northern border with Lebanon early in the war. It said municipalities scrambled to provide services to constituents who were displaced from homes destroyed in the attack or endangered by rockets launched by Hezbollah from Lebanon.
The police detentions and fraud inquiry were reported against a broader backdrop of investigations into corruption in Israel. AP said corruption scandals have been investigated by Israel’s state comptroller across different levels of government, and it noted that Benjamin Netanyahu faces charges in multiple corruption cases involving allegations of bribery, fraud and breach of trust that predate and are not connected to the Israel-Hamas war.