Kash Patel Defended Palestinian Trying to Buy Arms for the West Bank
The prosecutor is now the deputy to special counsel Jack Smith
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President-elect Donald Trump’s choice to lead the FBI once defended a Palestinian national caught on video trying to send explosives and hundreds of guns to the West Bank.
One of the prosecutors who beat Kash Patel in the 2010 case was Karen Gilbert. She’s now the deputy to the special counsel in the Trump investigations and a frequent target of Patel.
Their previous clash in this case has not been previously reported.
At the time, Patel was years from his current notoriety as a Trump loyalist. He was a federal public defender. And he argued that the defendant in the terror-related case ought to be set free on bond before trial.
Patel’s client was Abdalaziz Aziz Hamayel, a Palestinian native accused of trying to buy weapons to send to “his people” in the West Bank.
The FBI complaint against Hamayel alleged that on April 16, 2009, he contacted an unnamed person who was secretly a government source. Hamayel discussed weapons and explosives he wanted to buy.
“Hamayel specifically requested a quantity of 300 M-16 rifles, 9mm handguns, Uzi submachine guns, silencers and grenades,” the complaint said.
Hamayel said he could pay in advance because a “family friend” from his West Bank village would put up the money. The weapons were for “his people,” the complaint alleged. Hamayel had come to Florida from the West Bank when he was a child.
Hamayel also referred to a New York contact who was part of “his group” and said they had done similar deals, but wanted the government source to find a supplier.
The following month, the government source set up a meeting between Hamayel and an undercover officer posing as a dealer. Hamayel told the undercover cop he wanted M-16s, AK-47s, grenades, silencers, and improvised explosive devices (IEDs) that could be detonated via cell phone.
An intermediary speaking on Hamayel’s behalf told the potential supplier, “I could get a shipment like this once a month.”
At another May 2009 meeting, Hamayel revised the IED request. “Hamayel stated the detonation device did not need to be a phone,” the complaint said, “only something which would allow his people enough time to get out of the area before the bomb exploded.”
Hamayel said the weapons would be purchased by a man — never identified publicly — who owned a warehouse in Fort Lauderdale.
On June 11, 2009, the undercover cop brought some samples — all rendered safe — for Hamayel to check out:
Two M-16s
One AK-47, plus magazine
Two grenades
Three silencers
One Motorola walkie-talkie detonator and one walkie-talkie in an IED
One Nokia phone detonator and one phone in an IED
Hamayel handled the sample weapons and ultimately said the deal was on.
He opted for the hand-held radios, as many as the undercover cop could provide. Cell phones, Hamayel explained, wouldn’t work “over there.” He also put in a request for C-4 explosives. The cops got the meeting on video.
About a week later, Hamayel asked the government source for help getting fake driver’s licenses. He said he was headed to Chicago for two weeks.
That wasn’t true, however. He flew to the West Bank and didn’t come back for more than a year. When he returned to Miami — on a flight that originated in Amman, Jordan — Hamayel was arrested.
Patel was his public defender, for at least part of the case.
According to the Sept. 14, 2010, Miami Herald, Patel appeared in court as assistant federal defense counsel representing Hamayel. The case involved an FBI counterterrorism task force and reportedly was investigated as terror-related.
The Herald says Patel argued that Hamayel should be freed on a low bond and allowed to remain under house arrest while awaiting trial. Even though Hamayel had said he could get the purchase price — more than a quarter million dollars — in advance, Patel told the court that his client didn’t have money to make a high bond.
The magistrate countered that Hamayel was a flight risk. He had family in the West Bank and had just flown there with his father.
Plus, Hamayel had skipped two court hearings on a 2008 battery charge after allegedly hitting his estranged wife, the mother of their two-year-old son.
The magistrate called Hamayel a danger to the community and rejected Patel’s request to release him. A few months later, Hamayel worked out a plea deal. He was sentenced to four years in prison.
Nominated by Trump over the weekend to run the agency he once faced in court, Patel has vowed to go after investigators and prosecutors on the two federal Trump cases.
As Smith’s deputy, Gilbert would be near the top of that list. And Patel has attacked her publicly since she began investigating Trump.
Progressives have long argued for former public defenders to get federal leadership roles. And Justice Department critics have long complained about overreach by prosecutors and the FBI.
But there’s no sign of systemic reform on the horizon under Trump. Instead, his picks for top roles are focused solely on any element of law enforcement that dared investigate or prosecute him. That’s true of Patel more than most anyone.
Last year, Patel told a right-wing website that Gilbert was “one of the most corrupt prosecutors to ever come out of the Southern District of Miami.”
His evidence: A case in which Gilbert mishandled secret taping of the defense team. Patel even took his campaign against Gilbert to Fox, appearing on-air using that 2009 incident to undermine the credibility of the Trump prosecution.
He just didn’t mention that Gilbert the following year sent his client to prison in a terror case.
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Nice job digging this up. Not to be contrarian, nor to boost Patel’s probably spurious or exaggerated allegations about Gilbert’s corruption, but your reporting doesn’t exactly refute them. He could be right about her…and as a public defender, his courtroom advocacy for the guy was just him doing his job.
Being a public defender probably approached the only noble and ethical action he's taken in his life. Though it is newsworthy I suppose that he defended someone whose people have suffered 70 years of apartheid and 13 months of genocide, coming into conflict with Biden's and Trump's goal of slaughtering every person left in Palestine.