Iran is responsible for an attempt last week to funnel millions of dollars to Hamas in the Gaza Strip by way of Egypt, the Egyptian paper Al-Ahram reported on Saturday. The money was found in suitcases in the car of Hamas spokesman Ayman Taha. The suitcases reportedly contained $9 million along with 2 million Euros. An Egyptian official said the money represents "only a small portion of the large amounts of money Iran has funneled to Hamas over the last week."
Taha deposited the cash in a bank in the Egyptian town of El Arish last Thursday after Egyptian authorities stopped him taking it home to Gaza, police sources said. He later crossed into the Palestinian coastal strip without the money. The money is in an account at the state-owned National Bank of Egypt in El Arish in northern Sinai in the name of an Egyptian government body, Egytpian officials said.
Taha was part of a Hamas delegation which has been in Cairo for talks with Egyptian intelligence on a long-term truce between Israel and armed Palestinian groups in Gaza.
At the Rafah border crossing between Egypt and Gaza, Egyptian border authorities let through the other five members of the Hamas team but held back Taha because of the money.