Gaza border
Gaza borderFlash 90

World Vision has cancelled the contracts of 120 Palestinian Arab employees in Gaza amid Israeli allegations that the NGO’s Gaza director had diverted millions to Hamas, AFP reports.

A World Vision staffer who declined to be identified told the news agency, “They informed 120 employees from World Vision in Gaza they were officially cancelling their contracts and stopping all their projects in the enclave.”

“The head of the NGO in Palestine and a number of foreign staff met on August 9 with Palestinian employees in the Gaza office and gave them documents to sign which they did,” he added.

AFP saw a copy of the document which said World Vision “is facing a major crisis that has affected the international NGO, including the source of its funding, and due to this crisis all our activities have been suspended in Gaza”.

Senior employees would be kept on partial salaries, the World Vision source said.

The employee said World Vision promised to take back the staff once the crisis was resolved.

Israel recently arrested the Gaza head of World Vision, Mohammad El Halabi, and charged him with diverting millions of dollars in both materials and cash to Hamas, including its so-called “military wing”.

Foreign Ministry Director-General Dore Gold estimated recently that Halabi “managed to transfer in the decade of his work at World Vision...tens of millions of dollars."

Following the disclosure of the Hamas infiltration into World Vision, Australia announced it would cut funding to the group.

The court case is to be held in secret, with Halabi’s lawyer saying discussing details could mean jail.

World Vision has called on Israel to open the trial to the public.