USDBinance and CZ Sued for Allegedly Facilitating Over $1B in Hamas-Linked Crypto Transfers
Lawsuit Targets Binance Over Terror Financing Allegations Following Oct. 7 Hamas Attack
TL;DR
- 306 U.S. victims of the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks are suing Binance, CZ, and Heina Chen for allegedly enabling over $1B in terror-linked crypto flows.
- The complaint cites pre- and post-attack transfers, weak AML/KYC, and internal messaging suggesting deliberate tolerance of illicit activity.
- Plaintiffs seek ~$1B in damages, potentially tripled to ~$3B under ATA/JASTA statutes.
A federal lawsuit filed November 24, 2025, in North Dakota has escalated Binance’s long-standing compliance controversy into a direct terrorism-financing case, accusing the exchange and founder Changpeng Zhao of facilitating more than $1 billion in cryptocurrency flows tied to Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, Hezbollah, and the IRGC. The 284-page filing was brought forward by 306 U.S. victims and family members of those killed, injured, or kidnapped during the October 7, 2023 Hamas-led attacks, marking one of the most aggressive legal actions yet against a centralized crypto exchange under U.S. Anti-Terrorism statutes.
The suit argues Binance not only processed illicit value transfers, but also continued enabling them after the attack, alleging more than $50 million moved to identified terror-linked wallets post-October 7. Specific breakdowns referenced across investigative documents point to over $300 million in identified transactions before the attack and another $115 million afterward through Binance-controlled wallets, a figure plaintiffs frame as evidence that intervention never meaningfully escalated.
The filing pursues compensation of roughly $1 billion with treble damages under ATA/JASTA, exposing Binance to a potential ~$3 billion judgment if claims are upheld. Attorneys anchor the case to JASTA’s “knowing and substantial assistance” provision, a standard strengthened following an earlier 2025 decision in Raanan v. Binance Holdings Ltd., where a federal judge declined to dismiss ATA aiding-and-abetting claims. Legal observers note this new lawsuit leverages that precedent more aggressively by blending analytic tracing, Binance compliance logs, internal operational detail, and architecture-level critique.
Plaintiffs argue the exchange operated as “core infrastructure” for illicit capital flow through the use of omnibus wallets, internal off-chain ledgering, and alleged VIP exemptions, creating conditions where terror-linked funds could circulate without exposure to blockchain-level scrutiny. The complaint references compliance alerts where staff reportedly flagged accounts tied to terrorist financing but, according to plaintiffs, platform leadership failed to respond effectively. Cited internal messages claim employees acknowledged that “clients are here for crime” and that compliance concerns were knowingly deprioritized, statements the accusers characterize as proof of intent.
The case names Zhao and Binance executive Guangying “Heina” Chen directly, alongside the company itself. It arrives two years after Binance’s $4.32 billion settlement with U.S. authorities in 2023 and Zhao’s brief four-month sentence, later followed by a presidential pardon, and signals that regulatory resolutions did not fully close the venue on criminal-adjacency allegations. Legal representation includes Willkie Farr & Gallagher, with former CFTC chair Christopher Giancarlo and senior partner Lee Wolosky guiding the action, an indication that the plaintiffs are positioning the matter not as a symbolic filing but as a potential landmark precedent to redefine responsibility for centralized platforms handling high-risk global flows.
Observers speculate that if the case reaches discovery, wallet architecture, KYC exemptions, transaction-layer routing systems, and Binance’s growth-era engineering decisions may be scrutinized as possible enablers of terrorism financing. Much remains unresolved — the accusations still require demonstration of conscious participation, jurisdictional challenges are expected, and the multi-year litigation horizon means no outcome is near — yet the scale of the claim, both financially and legally, puts the exchange and the wider industry under uncommon pressure.
The lawsuit stands positioned as a stress fracture that could influence how risk, ledger design, and compliance are engineered across centralized markets going forward. Exchanges with internal pooling models may face heightened liability exposure if courts determine such systems materially obscure traceability or enable sanctioned recipients. A successful case could redefine what “knowingly” means for platforms operating at the pace of global liquidity — and place every major exchange on notice that missteps in monitoring are not just regulatory headaches but potentially billion-dollar civil threats tied to international conflict.
This article has been refined and enhanced by ChatGPT.
