A Hamas operative who held Israeli civilians hostage in Gaza said Hamas works with anti-Israel protesters and the media to spread anti-Semitism in the United States, according to a federal lawsuit filed Friday.
Former hostages Almog Meir Jan, Andrey Kozlov, and Shlomi Ziv say in the lawsuit that one of their Hamas captors, Abdallah Aljamal, told them that "Hamas in Gaza was coordinating with its allies, including its allies in the media and on college campuses, to foment hatred against Israel and Jews," the Times of Israel reported.
Ziv's captors, including Aljamal, "showed him a news report with stories and pictures of the Columbia protests and the Encampment," the court filing says.
"With the news report on, his captors told him, 'You see we have our own people everywhere,'" the filing goes on. "They then told him that Hamas has an 'army' operating out of Gaza that focuses specifically on media and sending Hamas propaganda and messaging throughout America and all around the world."
Jan, Kozlov, and Ziv were rescued in an Israel Defense Forces operation last June that killed Aljamal.
The revelation comes after anti-Semitic, pro-Hamas protests have swept U.S. college campuses following the terrorist group's Oct. 7, 2023, terrorist attack on Israel. President Donald Trump has cracked down on campus anti-Semitism, revoking billions of dollars in federal funding from universities that have repeatedly failed to protect Jewish students.
Columbia University, which Ziv's captors singled out, in particular has sparked widespread backlash for failing to curb pro-Hamas encampments and demonstrations that glorify violence against Jews. Earlier this month, a mob of agitators stormed a campus library, passed out pamphlets that openly endorsed Hamas's attacks, and chanted, "There is only one solution, intifada revolution."
The Friday lawsuit targets the People Media Project, a U.S.-based, tax-exempt nonprofit that runs the Palestine Chronicle, a pro-Hamas news outlet for which Aljamal wrote. According to the lawsuit, the Chronicle served as a platform for Aljamal to "disseminate Hamas propaganda," thereby providing material support to a U.S.-designated terrorist group.
Aljamal has "repeatedly expressed his hatred for the State of Israel and the United States" and said that "Hamas was going to ensure that the United States, as well as Jews and Israelis, are hated everywhere," according to the lawsuit.