TRT Forum Lists Tech for Palestine Founder Who Defended Hamas Membership
Paul Biggar, the Tech for Palestine founder who defended Hamas membership and questioned evidence of rape during the October 7 attacks, is advertised to speak at TRT World Forum in Istanbul on November 6 and 7.
The conference, organized by Turkey’s national broadcaster TRT, lists President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan among its inauguration speakers and Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan among its keynote speakers. Biggar’s official biography identifies him as Tech for Palestine’s founder and CEO.
His inclusion brings his own published statements into focus. In an article dated April 16, 2024, he argued that Hamas membership was “not illegal or even wrong” and asserted there was “little to no evidence of any rapes by Hamas on October 7.”
What Biggar wrote
The statements appear in footnotes to Meta and Lavender, a post criticizing Meta and Israeli military technology. His defense of Hamas membership formed part of an argument about whether membership alone made someone a lawful military target. In the same passage, he condemned Hamas’s October 7 violence against civilians as unlawful and immoral.
His claim about legality was not qualified by jurisdiction. Britain had already proscribed Hamas in its entirety in November 2021, making membership a criminal offense under UK law.
His assertion about rape evidence was broader than a challenge to one newspaper investigation: it questioned the evidence of any rape by Hamas during the attacks. The passages remain in the accessible version of his article.
The UN findings already on record
On March 4, 2024, more than six weeks before the article’s stated publication date, a mission led by UN sexual violence envoy Pramila Patten issued findings that rape and gang rape had occurred during the October 7 attacks on the standard of reasonable grounds to believe. The locations included the Nova festival area, Road 232 and Kibbutz Re’im.
The mission separately found clear and convincing information that some hostages had suffered sexual violence, including rape and sexualized torture, during captivity.
Those findings carried qualifications. The mission was not a criminal investigation, did not establish the overall prevalence of sexual violence and did not attribute each violation to a specific armed group. It also found at least two allegations concerning Kibbutz Be’eri unfounded and could not verify other accounts. Those limitations did not erase its affirmative findings elsewhere.
The evidence continued to develop. In its 2025 annual report, the UN secretary general listed Hamas among parties credibly suspected of responsibility for patterns of sexual violence. That later assessment is relevant to the evidence now available; it does not establish what Biggar knew when his article was published.
Intelligence backgrounds on the speaker roster
The forum’s lineup also includes figures with documented intelligence backgrounds. Fidan led Turkey’s National Intelligence Organization, known as MİT, for 13 years before becoming foreign minister in 2023, according to his ministry biography.
Another advertised speaker, Talha Köse, heads the National Intelligence Academy. The academy describes itself as a higher education institution established within MİT, where it conducts postgraduate teaching and research on intelligence and national security.
Russian defense analyst Ruslan Pukhov, director of the Centre for Analysis of Strategies and Technologies, or CAST, also appears on the roster. Estonia’s Foreign Intelligence Service identified him in its 2024 report as an FSB agent who informed a handler about foreign contacts and coordinated participation in international events.
CAST disputed that assessment. In a response published on February 13, 2024, its bmpd blog denied that either the organization or Pukhov was connected to the FSB, military intelligence or another Russian intelligence service. The response separately acknowledged his acquaintances and friendships with intelligence officials.
