Friday, July 12, 2024

Exclusive | Former Israeli hostage sues US group that employed captor

 Isabel Vincent (nypost.com)

"A former Israeli hostage freed last month in a daring Israel Defense Forces raid in Gaza is suing a US non-profit which employed his Hamas operative captor as a war correspondent, The Post has learned.

Almog Meir Jan, 22, filed the lawsuit Tuesday in Seattle federal court against People Media Project, a non-profit based in Olympia, WA.

The organization runs a pro-Palestinian news website and had frequently published the work of Abdullah Aljamal, a Gaza-based journalist and former spokesman for the terrorist organization. He began writing articles for the website in May 2019, according to court filings.“It is indisputable that defendants provided Hamas operative Aljamal, whose connections to Hamas were publicly known, with a US-based and taxpayer subsidized platform to publish Hamas propaganda and to pass the material off as independent journalism,” the lawsuit says.

“Moreover, the compensation defendants paid Hamas operative Aljamal for his propaganda directly enabled him to imprison plaintiff in his home.” . . .

"Jan was kidnapped by Hamas terrorists on Oct. 7 last year while he attended the Nova Music Festival. He was held hostage for 246 days, along with Andrey Kozlov, 27, and Shlomi Ziv, 41, at Aljamal family’s home in Nuseirat, according to the Israeli Defense Forces.

"Jan claimed he was “abused and mistreated” by his captors, according to legal papers.

"Aljamal, who wrote articles for the website lamenting the evils of war and had also worked as a spokesman for the Hamas Ministry of Labor, continued to have his work published by the Palestine Chronicle until just before the June 8 rescue operation.

"He and his family were killed during the raid, according to reports." . . .


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