Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin has urged the U.S. administration to bring about a halt in funding by Arab Americans of Hamas Moslem fundamentalists in the administered territories, according to reports here.
The reports come amid international political fallout over the Dec. 17 expulsion by Israel of over 400 Moslem fundamentalists who remain stranded in a strip of southern Lebanon between Lebanese and Israeli army checkpoints.
Pro-Hamas supporters are concentrated in Arab communities in Virginia and California, according to a weekend report on Israel Television by Ehud Ya’ari, a highly regarded Arab affairs correspondent.
Other media reports say Washington has already informed Israel it has no legal recourse against the activities of a Hamas leader in Virginia, Sheik Moussa Marzouk.
American authorities have also taken no action against a leader of the more radical Islamic Jihad fundamentalists.
Sheik Omar Abdul Rahman, a leader of the Islamic Jihad in Egypt, is currently in the United States.
The blind Moslem leader, who preaches in Brooklyn and New Jersey, has reportedly been involved in incitement to murder of tourists in Egypt and of Egyptian leaders.
And he has been tied to El Sayyid Nosair, who is serving a prison sentence for crimes associated with the murder of Rabbi Meir Kahane, leader of the anti-Arab Kach movement.
Jerusalem has also asked Washington to exert pressure on Saudi Arabia to stop transfer of funds to Hamas activists in the territories.
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