Israel left the Iranian regime without cryptocurrency
Date: 2023-06-28 Author: Karina Ziganova Categories: IN WORLD
Israeli authorities have announced the confiscation of millions of dollars in cryptocurrency intended to finance the Iranian regime
Israel has blocked millions of dollars in cryptocurrency, which was collected to sponsor the paramilitary organization Hezbollah (recognized as terrorist in the United States and European countries) and the pro-Iranian military group Quds Force (also recognized as terrorist). The Associated Press (AP) writes about this with reference to Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Galant. According to him, the blocked cryptocurrency came at the expense of the Israeli government.
According to Galant, the confiscation of such a large amount of money was made possible thanks to an interagency operation in which the Israeli intelligence service Mossad, military intelligence, as well as the Israeli police participated. According to AP, the Israeli authorities "confiscated cryptocurrency wallets." It is unclear on which site the Israeli authorities blocked the cryptocurrency.
In May, the editors wrote that Israel confiscated almost two hundred accounts on the Binance cryptocurrency exchange, which, presumably, were associated with the Islamic State * (IG or ISIS, a terrorist organization banned in the Russian Federation). According to Reuters, Binance deliberately maintained weak anti-money laundering controls. Since 2017, the crypto exchange has processed more than $10 billion in payments for criminals. However, Binance denied this data.
According to a study by the American blockchain firm Chainalysis, last year alone, the illegal use of cryptocurrency amounted to $20.1 billion. Moreover, the number of transactions related to sanctioned entities increased more than 100,000 times and accounted for 44% of illegal activity in 2022.
