One of the stranger sights of the refugee crisis that followed the 1994 Rwandan genocide was of stretcher-bearers rushing the dying to medical tents, with men running alongside reciting Bible verses to the withering patients.<\/p>\n
The bulk of the thousands of doctors and nurses struggling to save lives \u2013 as about 40,000 people died of cholera \u2013 were volunteers for the international medical charity M\u00e9decins Sans Fronti\u00e8res (MSF). The Bible readers were hired by the American televangelist and former religious right presidential candidate, Pat Robertson, and his aid organisation, Operation Blessing International.<\/p>\n
But on Robertson\u2019s US television station, the Christian Broadcasting Network, that reality was reversed, as he raised millions of dollars from loyal followers by claiming Operation Blessing was at the forefront of the international response to the biggest refugee crisis of the decade. It\u2019s a claim he continues to make, even though an official investigation into Robertson\u2019s operation in Virginia accused him of \u201cfraudulent and deceptive\u201d claims when he was running an almost non-existent aid operation\u2026<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was the most important first medical shipment on the scene out of everything,\u201d he said of one aid delivery as he appealed for donations. <\/p>\n
In another broadcast, Robertson said Operation Blessing was saving thousands of lives.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe death toll in this particular camp went down to almost zero because of our people being there,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Robertson claimed that Operation Blessing sent plane-loads of doctors.<\/p>\n
\u201cThese are tents set up with our doctors and our medical teams that came from here to work as hard as they could to save lives,\u201d Robertson said over pictures of a large tent of children on drips being tended by nurses and doctors.<\/p>\n
But the film was of MSF medical staff at work. Operation Blessing had just one tent and a total of seven doctors.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
And how those charity trips were used to transport mining equipment rather than doctors:<\/p>\n
Robert Hinkle, the chief pilot for Operation Blessing in Zaire in 1994, said he received new orders. \u201cThey began asking me: can we haul a thousand-pound dredge over? I didn\u2019t know what the dredging deal was about,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
The documentary describes how dredges, used to suck up diamonds from river beds, were delivered hundreds of miles from the crisis in Goma to a private commercial firm, African Development Company, registered in Bermuda and wholly owned by Robertson. ADC held a mining concession near the town of Kamonia on the far side of the country.<\/p>\n
\u201cMission after mission was always just getting eight-inch dredgers, six-inch dredgers \u2026 and food supplies, quads, jeeps, out to the diamond dredging operation outside of Kamonia,\u201d Hinkle told the film-makers.<\/p>\n
The pilot said he joined Operation Blessing to help people. Of the 40 flights he flew into Congo, just two delivered aid. The others were associated with the diamond mining. \u201cWe\u2019re not doing anything for those people,\u201d he said. \u201cAfter several months I was embarrassed to have Operation Blessing on the airplane\u2019s tail.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Just another TV evangelist scam.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Pat Robertson and his followers make a big deal about Operation Blessing, his longtime charity wing that makes all kinds of claims about all the good things they do. Critics have long accused him of using that charity to further his financial investments, especially in African mining. A new documentary provides evidence for those criticisms, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1582,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2707],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-22390","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-religious-frauds"],"yoast_head":"\n
Pat Robertson's Operation Blessing Scam<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Pat Robertson and his followers make a big deal about Operation Blessing, his longtime charity wing that makes all kinds of claims about all the good\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/dispatches\/2013\/09\/09\/pat-robertsons-operation-blessing-scam\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Pat Robertson's Operation Blessing Scam\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Pat Robertson and his followers make a big deal about Operation Blessing, his longtime charity wing that makes all kinds of claims about all the good\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/dispatches\/2013\/09\/09\/pat-robertsons-operation-blessing-scam\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Dispatches From the Culture Wars\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2013-09-09T17:07:40+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Ed Brayton\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Ed Brayton\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/dispatches\/2013\/09\/09\/pat-robertsons-operation-blessing-scam\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/dispatches\/2013\/09\/09\/pat-robertsons-operation-blessing-scam\/\",\"name\":\"Pat Robertson's Operation Blessing Scam\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/dispatches\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2013-09-09T17:07:40+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2013-09-09T17:07:40+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/dispatches\/#\/schema\/person\/a46043ad4bbeefc99b2c9fd59c67892f\"},\"description\":\"Pat Robertson and his followers make a big deal about Operation Blessing, his longtime charity wing that makes all kinds of claims about all the good\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/dispatches\/2013\/09\/09\/pat-robertsons-operation-blessing-scam\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/dispatches\/2013\/09\/09\/pat-robertsons-operation-blessing-scam\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/dispatches\/2013\/09\/09\/pat-robertsons-operation-blessing-scam\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/dispatches\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Pat Robertson’s Operation Blessing Scam\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/dispatches\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/dispatches\/\",\"name\":\"Dispatches From the Culture Wars\",\"description\":\"\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/dispatches\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/dispatches\/#\/schema\/person\/a46043ad4bbeefc99b2c9fd59c67892f\",\"name\":\"Ed Brayton\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/dispatches\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/2b0a130f5c33bc635684c57b128b0130?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/2b0a130f5c33bc635684c57b128b0130?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Ed Brayton\"},\"description\":\"After spending several years touring the country as a stand up comedian, Ed Brayton tired of explaining his jokes to small groups of dazed illiterates and turned to writing as the most common outlet for the voices in his head. He has appeared on the Rachel Maddow Show and the Thom Hartmann Show, and is almost certain that he is the only person ever to make fun of Chuck Norris on C-SPAN.\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/dispatches\/author\/ebrayton\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Pat Robertson's Operation Blessing Scam","description":"Pat Robertson and his followers make a big deal about Operation Blessing, his longtime charity wing that makes all kinds of claims about all the good","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/dispatches\/2013\/09\/09\/pat-robertsons-operation-blessing-scam\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Pat Robertson's Operation Blessing Scam","og_description":"Pat Robertson and his followers make a big deal about Operation Blessing, his longtime charity wing that makes all kinds of claims about all the good","og_url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/dispatches\/2013\/09\/09\/pat-robertsons-operation-blessing-scam\/","og_site_name":"Dispatches From the Culture Wars","article_published_time":"2013-09-09T17:07:40+00:00","author":"Ed Brayton","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Ed Brayton","Est. reading time":"3 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/dispatches\/2013\/09\/09\/pat-robertsons-operation-blessing-scam\/","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/dispatches\/2013\/09\/09\/pat-robertsons-operation-blessing-scam\/","name":"Pat Robertson's Operation Blessing Scam","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/dispatches\/#website"},"datePublished":"2013-09-09T17:07:40+00:00","dateModified":"2013-09-09T17:07:40+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/dispatches\/#\/schema\/person\/a46043ad4bbeefc99b2c9fd59c67892f"},"description":"Pat Robertson and his followers make a big deal about Operation Blessing, his longtime charity wing that makes all kinds of claims about all the good","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/dispatches\/2013\/09\/09\/pat-robertsons-operation-blessing-scam\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/dispatches\/2013\/09\/09\/pat-robertsons-operation-blessing-scam\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/dispatches\/2013\/09\/09\/pat-robertsons-operation-blessing-scam\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/dispatches\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Pat Robertson’s Operation Blessing Scam"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/dispatches\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/dispatches\/","name":"Dispatches From the Culture Wars","description":"","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/dispatches\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/dispatches\/#\/schema\/person\/a46043ad4bbeefc99b2c9fd59c67892f","name":"Ed Brayton","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/dispatches\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/2b0a130f5c33bc635684c57b128b0130?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/2b0a130f5c33bc635684c57b128b0130?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Ed Brayton"},"description":"After spending several years touring the country as a stand up comedian, Ed Brayton tired of explaining his jokes to small groups of dazed illiterates and turned to writing as the most common outlet for the voices in his head. He has appeared on the Rachel Maddow Show and the Thom Hartmann Show, and is almost certain that he is the only person ever to make fun of Chuck Norris on C-SPAN.","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/dispatches\/author\/ebrayton\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/dispatches\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22390","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/dispatches\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/dispatches\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/dispatches\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1582"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/dispatches\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22390"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/dispatches\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22390\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/dispatches\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22390"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/dispatches\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22390"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/dispatches\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22390"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}