by Ganesh Sahathevan
Human Appeal International (now known as Human Appeal Australia) continues to raise funds for Gaza via its office in Lakemba.
The highest representative of the Palestinian Authority in Australia, Ali Kazak, says he would not be surprised if money raised by one of Australia's largest Islamic charities is being filtered through to the hardline Palestinian group Hamas.
The Dubai-based Human Appeal International has an office at Lakemba in Sydney' south-west.
Its website says the Australian office is one of five international fundraising offices, and money raised goes to help 10 million refugees and orphans in 50 countries.
The European Union and the United States have proscribed Hamas as a terrorist organisation and frozen its assets.
Australia has not taken this action, although a recent FBI report has linked the charity directly to Hamas.
In July 2008 The Australian's Richard Kerbaj reported: ( July 31, 2008):
AN Australian charity that distributes humanitarian aid in the Middle East has been banned by the Israeli Government for allegedly bankrolling Palestinian terrorists.
Human Appeal International has been accused by the Israeli Defence Force of supporting the Palestinian organisation Hamas.
However, HAI's Sydney-based director, Bashar al-Jamal, refused to concede that Hamas was a terrorist organisation.
Mr al-Jamal denied that his organisation was associated with Hamas.
When asked if he believed Hamas, which was proscribed by Australia as a terrorist network on November 9, 2003, was such a group, he said: "It is a political question which goes beyond charity work. This is hard to answer you that it is a terrorist organisation ... a terrorist or non-terrorist group. How do you define terrorism, the concept of terrorism?
By 2017 Human Appeal was operating multiple accounts at the Commonwealth Bank (see list below from the Human These are no longer advertised on the Human Appea website.
By 2023 Human Appeal appears to have switched its accounts to Beyond Bank, a community customer owned bank. However, as the note below from the law from Kings Wood Mallseons describes, there are still issues as to whom Human Appeal is sending funds to:
“DE-BANKING” IN GOOD FAITH: WHEN CAN A BANK DE-BANK A CUSTOMER?
Beyond Bank justified its decision to close Human Appeal’s bank accounts based “on a recent review” that concluded that Human Appeal’s banking business was “not suited” to Beyond Bank. However, at the hearing before Parker J, Beyond Bank conceded that it was obliged to provide a valid commercial reason for the decision, even though, under its banking contract, it had a broad discretion to close an account without providing any justification. As Parker J noted, the concession was likely based on the bank’s obligations under the CoP, which were expressly incorporated into its banking contract, that it “act honestly” and “fairly and reasonably” in all dealings with its customers.
At the hearing, the bank argued that it had a valid reason to close Human Appeal’s accounts. The bank relied on evidence from its Chief Risk Officer that the bank’s Financial Crimes Team spent, on average, one hour per day reviewing the transactions to and from Human Appeal’s account due to the complexity and volume of those transactions. The bank’s evidence was that these transactions were significantly higher than for other customers of the bank. However, Parker J observed that there was no reason why the bank could not have stated to Human Appeal that it had been disproportionately engaged in working on their accounts and that the bank had not wished to continue to bear that administrative burden. In any event, Parker J rejected the bank’s evidence for several reasons, including that it did not state that Human Appeal’s activities required the bank to put on further staff, incur extra staffing expenses, or distracted the staff from performing other necessary functions.
The Court having rejected its evidence, the bank then invited the Court to draw an inference that the bank’s obligations under the Anti-Money Laundering and Counter-Terrorism Financing Act 2006 (Cth) (“the AML/CTF Act”) prevented it from disclosing the reasons to the Court because of the tipping off offences in s 123 of that Act. Justice Parker refused to draw that inference, holding that the offence in s 123 did not prevent disclosure to the Court, in general terms, of the administrative burden that the AML/CTF Act, together with other reporting obligations, imposed on the bank. His Honour stated that even if he was wrong on this conclusion, there was no evidence that the bank made any request to the CEO of AUSTRAC (the entity responsible for administering the AML/CTF Act) to modify the application of s 123 to allow the bank to conduct its defence to Human Appeal’s claim. As a result, his Honour held that the bank’s closing of Human Appeal’s account was invalid.
Human Appeal International Australia bank details:
• Bank: Commonwealth Bank of Australia
• BSB: 062-191
• Account Number for General Donations: 0090-3948
BANKS ACCOUNTS
| No. | List | Account Number |
| 1. | Orphans | 001/520/4542355/01 |
| 2. | Charitable Projects | 001/520/4542347/01 |
| 3. | Ongoing Charity | 001/520/4542363/01 |
| 4. | Almsgiving (Zakat) | 001/520/4543386/01 |
| 5. | Al-Aqsa Charitable Fund | 001/520/4542339/01 |
| 6. | Motherhood and Childhood | 001/520/4558782/01 |
| 7. | Sacrificial (Adahi) | 001/520/4716442/01 |
| 8. | Al-Fitr Almsgiving(Zakat) | 001/520/4809866/01 |
| 9. | Break Fasting | 001/520/4809874/01 |
| 10. | Urgent Relief | 001/520/4836561/01 |
| 11. | Internal Aids | 001/520/5279607/01 |
| 12. | Administrative Fund | 001/520/4542371/01 |
| 13. | Eid Dressing | 001/520/4716434/01 |
| 14. | Student’s Help | 001/520/5670640/01 |
| 15. | Orphan’s Consecration | 001/520/5751888/01 |
| 16. | Charitable Bread | 001/520/5317452/01 |
Account numbers of orphans at different banks
| No. | List | Account Number |
| 1. | Dubai Islamic Bank | 01520454235501 |
| 2. | Emirates NBD | 1012009988602 |
| 3. | Commercial Bank of Dubai | 1000186419 |
| 4. | Abu Dhabi Islamic Bank | Orphans / 10105542 / 1072410 charity projects / |
| 5. | National Bank of Abu Dhabi | 0155738120 |
| 6. | Abu Dhabi Commercial Bank | 179636020001 |
| 7. | ُEmirates Bank international | 1011048830801 |
| 8. | Emirates Islamic Bank | 0021656999001 |
| 9. | Commercial International Bank | 100060305933 |
| 10. | Sharjah Islamic Bank | 0030341882001 |
| 11. | Union National Bank | 8701009069 |
| 12. | Bank of England ( HSBC ) | 04500100001 |
| 13. | Bank of Umm Al-Qaiwain | 0050040771 |
| 14. | Mashreq Bank | 0691125611 |
| 15. | Ajman Bank | 017777757012 |
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