Palestine Childrens Relief Fund (PCRF)

Activities

• Headquartered in Ohio with offices in Ramallah, Gaza City, Jordan, and Beirut, and chapters in additional locations.
• While claiming a mission to “provide medical and humanitarian relief collectively and individually to Arab children throughout the Levant, regardless of their nationality, politics or religion,” PCRF promotes a narrative of sole Israeli aggression and minimizes the role of Palestinian violence.
• PCRF systematically erases Palestinian terror attacks against Israeli civilians, including thousands of rocket attacks.

Concerns Relating to Fundraising Partnerships

• In 2004, the Holy Land Foundation attempted to make a donation of $50,000 to PCRF to “provide immediate relief services.” The HLF assets were frozen by the U.S. Treasury in 2001 based on evidence that it was funneling money to Hamas.
• In 2003, the United States Department of Justice published a bulletin claiming that “the unofficial HAMAS website…contained a hyperlink to the official HAMAS site, as well as to several United States-based charities, including…the Palestinian Children’s Relief Fund.” The bulletin also claimed that the “unofficial Hizballah Website…did contain a hyperlink to what was described as the official Hizballah Website…as well as to the unofficial HAMAS site (www.hamas.org)…and the Palestinian Children’s Relief Fund.”
• According to PCRF’s 2022 annual report, PCRF partners with Islamic Relief Palestine (IRPAL), an “affiliate” of Islamic Relief Worldwide (IRW). 
  • On June 19, 2014, Israel’s Defense Minister declared IRW to be illegal, based on its alleged role in funneling money to Hamas, and banned it from operating in Israel and the West Bank. (Hamas is a designated terror organization by Israel, the U.S., EU, and Canada.) According to news reports, the decision was made after “the Israel Security Agency (Shin Bet), the coordinator for government activities in the territories, and legal authorities provided incriminating information against IRW.”
  • Since 2006, IRPAL has cooperated with the Al-Falah Society. According to the Meir Amit Institute, the Al-Falah Society Charitable is one of “Hamas’s charitable societies.”
    • Al-Falah is run by Ramadan Tanboura – according to Haaretz, a “well-known Hamas figure.” According to the Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center, Hamas held a reception for Tanboura “on his return from an eight-month fund-raising trip to the Gulf States. Senior Hamas figures also participated.”
  • IRPAL partners with the Gaza Zakat Committee (GZC), also known as the Islamic Zakat Society (IZS). IZS works closely with the Hamas government and is managed by Hamas preacher Hazem Al-Sirraj.
    • According to Dr. Emanuel Schaeublin, a lecturer at the University of Zurich, GZC has ties to Fatah, the PFLP, and Hamas. Islamic Relief UK and Islamic Relief Canada are both named by IZS as its patrons.
  • In 2006, IRW Gaza coordinator Iyaz Ali, a Pakistani-born British national, was arrested and charged with transferring funds and assistance to “Hamas institutions and organizations, including the Al Wafa and Al Tzalah associations, which have been outlawed in Israel. He also admitted that he worked in Jordan and cooperated with local Hamas operatives.” 
  • In January 2021, the US State Department cut ties with IRW due to “anti-Semitism exhibited repeatedly by IRW’s leadership.”
• PCRF also partners with Taawon (Welfare Association).
  • The Welfare Association is funded by the Islamic Development Bank that has transferred hundreds of millions of dollars to support Hamas.  
  • Other partners of Taawon include the PFLP-linked NGOs Health Work Committees (HWC), ACHA, Union of Agricultural Work Committees (UAWC), and the Union of Health Work Committees (UHWC). 
• Since 2013 (at least), AMP has been a regular supporter and fundraising host for PCRF’s “run for peace” fundraising event. Since 2016 (at least), PCRF has participated in AMP’s conventions, distributing leaflets, artwork, and shirts, and raising funds.
  • In March 2016, AMP honored then PCRF chair of the board Khaled Abughazaleh with its annual Al Quds Award during the AMP’s “I Am Al-Quds” fundraiser.
• PCRF has partnered with the Zakat Foundation of America (ZFA). Khalil Demir serves as the Executive Director of ZFA.
  • Demir formerly worked at the Benevolence International Foundation. According to an IRS tax filing of the Benevolence International Foundation from 2000, “The books are in care of Halil I. Demir.” Benevolence International Foundation was designated by the Treasury Department as a financier of terrorism in 2002.
• In November 2023, PCRF Founder Steve Sosebee spoke at a Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) event, where they raised $30,000 for PCRF.
• In November 2023, PCRF Tampa held a fundraising event featuring Hatem Fariz. In 2006, Fariz pled guilty for providing services to the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, a designated terrorist organization.

Leadership 

• Steve Sosebee – Founder and President
  • October 28, 2023: Sosebee tweeted, “I have an Arab, Muslim, immigrant, African family.  I love most of my life in Palestine.  There is no security between Trump or Biden.  But Biden supports genocide.” (emphasis added)
  • October 23, 2023: Sosebee retweeted a video of Gaza that said, “Praise be to God who saved us from the massacres committed by the Zionist occupation against the Palestinian people and gave us a new life.”
  • October 23, 2023: Sosebee described his interview on MSNBC as “concerning the genocide in Gaza.”
  • December 2017: Sosebee published a photo of a sign calling on all British citizens to “offer your apologies and hold responsibility for the Balfour’s Declaration which has caused all the pain and sufferings of the Palestinians since its declaration till this very moment.” Sosebee added “#Balfour #Palestine #Nakba.”
• Amal Al-Haimoni – Area Coordinator – Hebron
  • October 2023: Al-Haimoni changed her profile picture to an illustration of a man eating with an apron featuring the Star of David eating what is supposed to represent a Palestinian child, using a fork with the US flag and a knife reading “The Arab [world’s] silence.” 

• • October 2023: Al-Haimoni changed her profile picture to a photoshopped image of a soldier stomping the beheaded head of Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu and in the background a picture of a boy raising the flag of Palestine at the Dome of the Rock.

• • October 2023: Al-Haimoni changed her Facebook profile picture to a picture of the borders of the State of Israel that reads “This land cannot accommodate two identities, it is either us or us.” 

• December 2016: PCRF Gaza Area Manager Suhail Flaifl published a photo “honoring” Haider Abdel Shafi, founder of the Abdel Shafi Community Health Association (ACHA), formerly known as the Red Crescent Society for the Gaza Strip (RCS4GS). According to ACHA, Abdel Shafi was arrested for “supporting the military activities” of the PFLP; “he always denied membership of the PFLP” but “expressed sympathy for its radical stand.”
• August 2022: PCRF Program Coordinator in Jenin Bana Abbadi tweeted, “O Lord, be kind to our people in Gaza and make the situation they are in easy for them. The plot of the Zionist occupation in their throats has been removed. O Lord, O Most Merciful of the Merciful. Have mercy on the martyrs and heal the wounded and injured.”
• Tala Habash – Chapters Coordinator Assistant
  • Before joining PCRF, Habash served as the Vice President of Florida State University’s chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine.
  • July 2020: tweeted, “Everyone should read Ghassan Kanafani’s ‘The Land of Sad Oranges’, which frames this hurt that palestinians know so well in the most beautiful and memorable way.”
    • Kanafani was a leading member of the PFLP 
  • July 2020: signatory on a letter written by Florida State University students and alumni calling to “Replace the IHRA definition with a serious analysis of antisemitism that affirms the centrality of ending white supremacy in the struggle to end all related systems of oppression.” (On the campaign to undermine the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) working definition of antisemitism, see NGO Monitor’s report, “The NGO Campaign to Discredit the IHRA Definition.”)