San Diego Man Charged in Alleged $600K Hamas Fundraising Scheme
DOJ says San Diego’s Reda Sabassi used a California charity to raise $600,000 after Oct. 7 and route funds to Hamas through Gaza Now, a Hamas-linked online fundraising network
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The Justice Department unsealed a five-count criminal complaint on June 17, 2026, charging Reda Mazen Rida Sabassi, 38, of San Diego — a naturalized U.S. citizen — with terrorism, sanctions-evasion, wire fraud, money laundering, and making false statements in connection with a scheme that allegedly raised $600,000 through fraudulent humanitarian appeals and funneled the proceeds to Hamas.
According to the complaint, Sabassi exploited the October 7, 2023, massacres to solicit donations from around the world including donors in the United States and New York, then sent approximately $116,000 directly to a Hamas member while attempting to convert another $382,000 into cryptocurrency for transfer through Gaza Now — the Hamas-linked propaganda and fundraising network.
“Ikram”: A California Nonprofit Linked to Terror Funding
Since at least 2022, the complaint alleges, Sabassi operated a California-registered nonprofit called Ikram — The Arab Charity Foundation Inc. as the public face of his fundraising operation. Records with the California Secretary of State’s Office list Sabassi as the organization’s chief executive officer, chief financial officer, and secretary — its sole officer. “Ikram” is an Arabic word meaning honor, hospitality, or generosity: a name calibrated to signal legitimacy to international donors moved by Gaza’s suffering.
In practice, according to federal prosecutors, it was a vehicle for something else entirely. Sabassi used the Ikram banner across social media platforms and crowdfunding websites to solicit donations he claimed would deliver humanitarian aid to civilians in Gaza. Court documents reviewed by the FBI reveal that Sabassi and an unnamed co-conspirator privately joked about naming their fundraiser after Hamas’s military wing, the al-Qassam Brigades, before choosing the less conspicuous Ikram brand to avoid scrutiny.
Following the Money
Between December 2023 and February 2024, the complaint states, Sabassi raised approximately $600,000 through online campaigns. Federal prosecutors trace the money along three documented outflows, each documented in the criminal filing.
The most direct transfer sent approximately $116,000 to a Hamas operative, according to the DOJ press release. The second and largest channel attempted to convert $382,000 in funds into cryptocurrency for transmission to Hamas through Gaza Now — a platform the U.S. Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control designated as a Specially Designated Global Terrorist entity in March 2024, alongside its founder and two UK-based partner companies. A third channel, identified in the complaint, directed a portion of donor funds to Sabassi’s own expenses.
The Gaza Now Network
The DOJ press release notes that Gaza Now and two of Sabassi’s alleged co-conspirators were designated as Specially Designated Global Terrorists in March 2024. Those co-conspirators are Mustafa Ayash — founder and director of Gaza Now, a Palestinian national who operated from Linz, Austria — and Aozma Sultana, the UK-based director of Al-Qureshi Executives and Aakhirah Limited, two companies that donated thousands of dollars to Gaza Now and co-promoted its Hamas fundraising campaigns.
As Jewish Onliner reported in September 2025, Ayash’s Gaza Now network exploded in reach after October 7, 2023, growing from roughly 344,000 Telegram subscribers to nearly 1.9 million by November of that year. Blockchain analysis by Chainalysis revealed that Gaza Now’s designated cryptocurrency wallets — spanning Bitcoin, Ethereum, and multiple USDT addresses — had received nearly $4.5 million in digital assets before the US and UK crackdown. Ayash was detained by Dutch authorities at Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport in September 2025 and faced extradition to Austria.
Propaganda, Arrests, and What Comes Next
The complaint documents Sabassi’s role as a Hamas propagandist alongside his fundraising operation. Prosecutors allege he produced a one-hour video compilation of the October 7 massacres and posted it to at least two social media accounts — and republished it on the attacks’ two-year anniversary.
The investigation involved the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Forces in both New York and San Diego, along with U.S. Customs and Border Protection. The prosecution is being handled by the SDNY’s Illicit Finance and Money Laundering Unit alongside its National Security and International Narcotics Unit, with assistance from the DOJ’s National Security Division Counterterrorism Section.
“As alleged in the complaint, the defendant exploited the barbaric acts of terror perpetrated on October 7, 2023, to attract donors to his fraudulent ‘humanitarian’ causes,” said Assistant Attorney General for National Security John A. Eisenberg. “He allegedly raised hundreds of thousands of dollars through this scheme, which he then funneled to Hamas to help finance that group’s terror and violence and to line his own pockets.”