Israel has welcomed a federal judge’s ruling that a leader of Hamas can be extradited to Israel because there is reasonable cause to believe he is linked to a Hamas conspiracy to commit violence.
“There is more than sufficient evidence to show that Musa Abu Marzook was a member of the conspiracy known as Hamas and that the acts charged against him were foreseeable consequences of the conspiracy,” wrote U.S. District Court Judge Kevin Duffy.
Gideon Mark, spokesman for the Israeli Consulate in New York said, “We welcome the decision which proves again that the material we supplied in our request for extradition was well-established information.”
While an appeal by Marzook is expected, the judge’s decision “is an important step in the cooperation’ between the United States and Israel “in the fight against terrorism,” said Mark.
A Hamas leader in the Gaza Strip reportedly called the ruling a “criminal act.”
Duffy ordered that Marzook be held in a New York federal prison until he is turned over to Israeli authorities. Marzook was arrested last July as he tried to enter the United States, where he had been living for several years.
Israel requested the extradition, charging that the 45-year-old engaged in a conspiracy to commit murder and other crimes against Israelis and has raised money for the military wing of Hamas.
“Marzook is responsible for atrocities and crimes perpetrated against our population and we would like to try him and sentence him for these crimes,” Israel’s ambassador to the United States, Itamar Rabinovich, said in March.
U.S. prosecutors also have charged that Marzook raised money for arms for Hamas and recruited terrorists.
Marzook has described himself as the head of the political bureau of Hamas and has denied he raised money in the United States to send abroad.
He also has denied that Hamas has any organized activity in the United States.
“Hamas’ only structure is inside Palestine,” he told The New York Times recently. “There is no organization outside.”
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