Sunday Mail discovers how British tax money is funding 'Palestinian' terrorism
The 'Palestinians' are building the palace above for 'moderate' 'Palestinian' President Mahmoud AbbasAbu Mazen using £8,000,000 (about $11,310,000) of British aid money, and after visiting the site, London's Sunday Mail Online has finally exposed it.
The shocking revelation that thousands of Palestinian terrorists, including men who have masterminded suicide bombings and murdered children, are given cash handouts from aid money will cause anger and disbelief, particularly in the wake of the Brussels massacres.
In the West Bank and Gaza, despite promises by the ruling Palestinian Authority (PA) to end the practice of paying aid money to convicted terrorists, our investigation revealed that they had simply duped the West by allowing the Palestine Liberation Organisation to hand out the cash instead.
Britain gives £72 million a year to Palestine, more than one-third of which goes straight to the PA. It openly admits supporting terrorists whom it hails as heroes for fighting illegal occupation, awarding lifetime payments that rise depending on time spent in jail and the seriousness of crimes.
One Hamas master bomber has reportedly been given more than £100,000. Other ‘salaries’ go to the families of suicide bombers and even teenagers involved in the latest upsurge of deadly attacks on Israel.
DFID and the European Union are still effectively supporting these payments to thousands of terrorists – despite claims to have ended such links two years ago. This was confirmed to the MoS by former prisoners and families receiving the cash, and in official statements by the PA.
In fact, the 'Palestinians' are the main subject of the Mail's 'expose,' most of which could have been written by combing the archive of this blog and several others.
Ahmad Musa sits beside me, a convicted double murderer sentenced to life in prison. As we talk, I ask him if he did indeed kill the two men. ‘Yes, I shot them dead,’ he replies.
Yet we do not meet in a jail cell. Musa is free, released after just five years. For he is a Palestinian terrorist and he was liberated under a peace deal.
Like thousands more Palestinian prisoners, including jihadi bombers and killers of children, Musa enjoys his freedom after being awarded a ‘salary’ for life.
He gets £605 every month, others get far more. If they die, the cash goes to their family. These men are seen as terrorists, certainly by Israel, and many in the West.
But, astonishingly, the money behind these payments – described by some as ‘rewards for murder’ – flows from British and European taxpayers.
For the record, that 'salary' is about 150% of the average teacher's salary in the 'Palestinian Authority.'
The UK cash comes from the Department for International Development, which will give up to £25.5million this year to the ruling Palestinian Authority (PA) as part of a £72million aid package. Our investigation discovered that the PA passes millions on to the infamous Palestinian Liberation Organisation (PLO) – which in turn gives it to convicted terrorists locked up in Israeli prisons and their families.
Among them are Amjad and Hakim Awad, cousins who killed Ehud and Ruth Fogel and their three children in their West Bank home in 2011. It is estimated that Amjad alone may have been paid up to £16,000 from the fund so far.
Yes, those are the Fogels HY"D (May God Avenge their blood) in the pictures above. Hakim was 18 and Amjad was 19 when they murdered the Fogels. Unfortunately, they're unlikely to die the slow and painful deaths they so richly deserve. Instead, they are being supported by British and European taxpayers.
Also on the payroll is Abdallah Barghouti, the Hamas bomb-maker who was sentenced to life after attacks in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv. It is thought he has received payments totaling £106,000.
Barghouti prepared the Sbarro suicide bombing (pictured above).
Dfid confirms that the PLO makes such payments, calling them ‘social welfare’ provisions for prisoners’ families.
It denies, however, that any British cash reaches terrorists, with the PLO taking over such payments two years ago from the PA after an international outcry.
But a Mail on Sunday investigation has found that Britain funded the PLO until last year and that the PA openly boasts of still funding salaries of convicted terrorists, even in its own official statements.
Former prisoners and the families of terrorists we have spoken to also confirmed receiving cash from both the PA and the PLO.
British aid money is supposed to be rebuilding and developing the Palestinian territories. However a devastating new report to be released this week by Palestinian Media Watch, an Israeli NGO, suggests that Western donors have been duped by assertions that the Authority no longer funds terrorists.
Some Hamas terrorist masterminds have reportedly been given more than £100,000.
Other ‘salaries’ go to relatives of suicide bombers and even teenagers involved in the latest upsurge of deadly attacks on Israel. Several ex-prisoners confirmed to me that they were paid monthly stipends that started in jail.
One said they also received a ‘bonus’ on leaving prison and lucrative civil service job offers, the most senior posts going to those serving more than 15 years behind bars, even though they are not qualified.
PA officials openly defend such stipends. Amr Nasser, adviser to the minister of social affairs, said: ‘It is not a crime to be fighting occupation. These people are heroes.
‘We could be giving them much more money and it would not be enough.’ Nasser added that, if Palestine won independence, the government would seek reparations from Britain for its historic role in encouraging Zionism, saying ‘You should pay us more money.’
Cash is fungible.
There is no difference between the 'Palestinian Authority' and the PLO. It's a shell game.
And lest you think the Mail actually gets that they're doing something wrong other than wasting British taxpayer money... they don't.
The four million Palestinians living under Israeli occupation in the West Bank and Gaza receive the highest aid support per head in the world. Few would deny they face unique problems given checkpoints, tough crackdowns and disputed settlements.
Their 'unique problems' are entirely of their own making. They could have had a peace agreement 22 years ago and more. They didn't want one.
I don't buy the claim made throughout this article that the 'Palestinians' are 'fooling' the West. They're not. Itamar Marcus, the author of the report on which the part of this article that deals with the 'Palestinians' is based, agrees.
Itamar Marcus, the report’s author, said: ‘There is wilful blindness by the UK and EU, who were happy not to even carry out the simplest investigation.’
Indeed.
But what's most astounding about this article is that it was supposed to be a report on how British foreign aid is wasted in general. There are about two paragraphs about other places in the world, and much, much more about the 'Palestinians,' who are Europe's (and Britain's) pet project. You don't think that has anything to do with rampant anti-Semitism in Britain and Europe, do you?
Your tax dollars and euros at work: Camp Jihad video
Here's a video describing Camp Jihad, sponsored by UNRWA and paid for with your tax dollars and euros (and shekels).
Let's go to the videotape (Hat Tip: Ricky G).
By the way, the cities they are mentioning are NOT in Judea and Samaria. They are within the Israel of the 1949 armistice lines. Lest you think that a 'two-state solution' is going to have any effect on these people....
Some of you might be wondering why it matters so much whether Europe decides to designate Hezbullah a terrorist organization. Please consider this.
A ban on Hezbollah could cripple it. Hezbollah‘s Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah acknowledged
this reality several years ago, notingthat
an EU terror listing "would dry up the sources of
finance, end moral, political and material support, stifle voices, whether they
are the voices of the resistance or the voices which support the resistance,
pressure states which protect the resistance in one way and another, and
pressure the Lebanese state, Iran and Iraq, but especially the Lebanese state,
in order to classify it as a state which supports terrorism."
Any of you who thought that Prime Minister Netanyahu had finally learned to say 'no' to the Left after all these years are sorely mistaken.The Primee Minister folded again on Tuesday, providing the 'broke' 'Palestinian Authority' with NIS 400 million (a little more than $108 million) to pay terrorists' salaries. This is from the first link.
Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu decided on Tuesday evening to transfer to the
Palestinian Authority some NIS 400 million Israel collected last month in tax
revenue for the PA, but withheld in response to the Palestinian statehood
upgrade move at the UN in November.
A source in Netanyahu’s bureau said
the decision was for a one-time transfer and was due to the economic hardships
facing the PA.
Netanyahu met on Monday in Jerusalem with Quartet envoy
Tony Blair, where this issue was raised. The US has also raised the issue with
Jerusalem.
Government sources rejected speculation that the move was a
confidence-building measure toward the PA taken in the wake of the recent Israeli
election to try and create a more positive atmosphere.
The sources also
denied the move was related to the coalition-building steps and the likelihood that Yesh Atid, which
has called for promoting talks with the Palestinians, is to be a key member of
the new coalition.
Further transfers to the PA of the tax revenues would
be evaluated on a month-bymonth basis, sources said.
...
Netanyahu’s decision rolls back an
announcement former foreign minister Avigdor Liberman made on December 10 that
Israel would not transfer a shekel of tax revenue to the PA for the next four
months. Liberman said the PA owed Israel NIS 6 billion, which included NIS 900m.
that the PA owed to Israel for electric and water bills, and NIS 700m. that was
owed for funds advanced in the summer to pay PA salaries.
Fellow Israelis, look for our electric rates to go up to pay off the Electric Company on the 'Palestinians' behalf. What could go wrong?
Congress to investigate 'Palestinian' use of US funds
It's about time.
Congress will investigate the use of American funds by the 'Palestinian Authority' after a Yisrael Beiteinu MK sent a letter detailing the construction of homes for, and subsidization of living expenses of, freed terrorists by the 'Palestinian Authority.'
Congressmen Ted Deutsch (D-FLA) and Steve Israel (D-NY) have asked US Comptroller-General Gene Dodaro to investigate the Palestinian Authority’s use of American funding, three weeks after MK Moshe Matalon (Israel Beiteinu) sent a letter informing the budget committees of the US Senate and House of Representatives of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas’s policy to pay murderers released from Israeli prisons $5,000 and build them new homes.
“Many of the released prisoners were convicted of orchestrating and carrying out Hamas-sponsored terrorist attacks in Israel, including the bombing of a Tel Aviv nightclub that killed 21 people, the attack on a Netanya hotel that killed 29 people, and the bombing of a Sbarro Pizzeria that killed 15 people,” Deutsch and Israel wrote.
The two congressmen explained to Dodaro that they “are troubled by reports of President Abbas’ use of Palestinian Investment Fund (PIF) funds to provide housing for these convicted terrorists.”
According to the letter, the US contributed to the PIF after PA Prime Minister Salam Fayyad founded it in 2002 “under a framework of transparency and accountability.” However, recently there has been “ambiguity surrounding the amount of US taxpayer dollars contributed to the PIF,” Deutsch and Israel wrote.
In addition to Abbas’ plans to build houses for terrorists, Deutsch and Israel “are concerned about the increasing lack of transparency for the PIF as well as reports that Prime Minister Fayyad is no longer overseeing the fund and that Hamas has taken control of PIF assets in Gaza.”
The letter also requests that the US Government Accountability Office, which Dodaro heads, investigate whether US Economic Support Funds (ESF) given to the PA were used to fund Abbas’ ’”trips around the world “on his misguided attempt to unilaterally declare statehood at the United Nations…efforts that are in direct contravention of US policy.”
The congressmen say US ESF should not be used “to fund Mr. Abbas’ extensive lobbying to achieve a Palestinian state by any means other than direct negotiations with Israel.”
“The US must be unequivocally committed to ensuring that American taxpayer dollars are used to serve the interests of the US and our allies around the world,” Deutsch and Israel wrote.
Additionally, Israel Radio reported late Thursday night that the Israeli government has decided to continue to withhold tax revenues from the 'Palestinian Authority' in light of the 'progress' reported at talks between Fatah and Hamas in Cairo on Thursday. According to a statement released by the government, Abu Mazen must understand that the closer he gets to Hamas, the further he gets from peace. Somehow, that seems to concern us a lot more than it concerns Abu Mazen.
Ros-Lehtinen foreign aid restrictions barely make it out of committee
With a $14.5 trillion deficit and the country mired in a deep, double dip recession (which has looked more like a prolonged single dip), you would think that there would be better uses for American funds than supporting the likes of the 'Palestinian Authority,' revolutionary Egypt and Pakistan. Well, Congress agrees with you, writes Liz Berney, but just barely.
The Republican Chairwoman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, recently introduced H.R. 2583, “The Foreign Relations Authorization Act, Fiscal Year 2012,” which seeks to de-fund U.S. foreign aid to Pakistan, Lebanon, Egypt, Yemen and the Palestinian Authority unless these regimes meet certain critical conditions, including the following:
• Further aid to Pakistan would be conditioned on Pakistan: assisting “investigating the existence of an official or unofficial support network in Pakistan for Osama bin Laden,” including access to bin Laden’s relatives and former compound in Abottabad; facilitating visas to U.S. citizens engaged in counterterrorism efforts; and complying with existing strategic assistance requirements to cooperate with the war on terror. (H.R. 2583, Section 982)
• Lebanon would not receive further aid if a member of Hezbollah (or other terrorist organization) serves in any government policy position. Hezbollah currently dominates the Lebanese cabinet; thus Lebanon would need to change this to receive further U.S. aid. The proposed law would also require the Lebanese government: to comply with the Special Tribunal investigating the assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri; to dismantle foreign terrorist organization infrastructure; and to engage in anti-terrorism vetting and tracking of Lebanon’s security forces benefitting from U.S. assistance. (Section 962) These are all eminently reasonable conditions. We should not be funding a government dominated by the very same Hezbollah terrorist organization that perpetrated terrorist attacks which killed hundreds of U.S. marines, and that is now pointing 45,000 missiles at Israel.
• Further aid to the Palestinian Authority would be conditioned on: the PA finally terminating its anti-Israel incitement in the media, schools, mosques and other government-controlled institutions; no member of Hamas or other foreign terrorist organization serving in any government policy position; the PA finally meeting its obligations to dismantle foreign terrorist infrastructure, confiscate unauthorized weapons, pre-empt terrorist attacks and fully cooperate with Israeli security services; the PA’s recognition of Israel as a Jewish state; and anti-terrorism vetting and tracking of security services benefitting from U.S. assistance. (Section 971) These are also eminently reasonable conditions. U.S. foreign aid should not be sent to terrorists or to governments that incite terrorism or break their agreements to thwart terrorism.
• Security assistance to Egypt would be prohibited unless the U.S. President submits a report certifying that the Egyptian government: (i) is not directly or indirectly controlled by a foreign terrorist organization, its affiliates or supporters; (ii) is fully implementing the Israel-Egypt Peace Treaty; and (iii) is detecting and destroying smuggling networks and tunnels between Egypt and Gaza. (Section 951) These items reflect Congresswoman Ros-Lehtinen’s call for “the unequivocal rejection of any involvement by the Muslim Brotherhood and other extremists who may seek to exploit and hijack these events to gain power.” (By contrast, the Obama administration, through its prior spokesperson Robert Gibbs, said that the new Egyptian government “has to include a whole host of important nonsecular actors.” In other words, Obama insists that the new Egyptian government must include the Muslim Brotherhood, a terrorist organization that promotes arms smuggling into Gaza and wants to tear up the Israeli-Egyptian peace treaty.)
Chairwoman Ros-Lehtinen’s bill would also require the Secretary of State to submit a report that the Egyptian government is adopting and implementing legal reforms that protect the religious and democratic freedoms of all citizens and residents of Egypt. The last item is aimed at stopping the horrific recent Islamist slaughters of Egyptian Christian Copts.
H.R. 2583 also contains “national security waiver” provisions permitting the President to waive above-mentioned conditions on foreign aid if the President determines this to be vital to U.S. national security.
On July 21, 2011, Congresswoman Ros-Lehtinen’s bill passed out of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, 23 to 20. Every Republican on the Foreign Affairs Committee voted for the bill. Sadly, every Democrat on the Foreign Affairs Committee (including our local Congressman Ackerman) voted against this worthy legislation. It is particularly disappointing that Ackerman voted against the bill, in light of some recent constructive comments that Ackerman made condemning the PA’s incitement of terrorism and favoring defunding a Hamas-allied PA. Ackerman should “vote where his mouth is.”
After passage out of committee, Chairwoman Ros-Lehtinen’s terrorism defunding bill ran into an even bigger wall of Obama administration and Democratic Party opposition. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton wrote a blistering letter to the House Foreign Affairs Committee, charging that the proposed defunding law would be “debilitating” to Mrs. Clinton’s “efforts to carry out considered foreign policy and diplomacy.” Since when does any sane “considered foreign policy and diplomacy” include sending our tax dollars to terrorist regimes? It is Congress’s right and duty to place restrictions on foreign aid: The Constitution doesn’t give Mrs. Clinton and the State Department “carte blanche” with our tax dollars.
Outrageously, Mrs. Clinton also complained that the restrictions on aiding governments containing terrorists were “crippling.” She also wrote that certifications regarding the involvement of foreign terrorist organizations in governments and the Palestinian Authority were “burdensome and infeasible” for the Obama administration. In other words, it’s too much trouble for the Obama administration to determine whether our tax dollars are going to terrorists!
Mrs. Clinton also specifically objected to a portion of the bill that requires the President to finally move the U.S. Embassy to Israel’s capital (Jerusalem) by 2014.
Mrs. Clinton’s letter also threatened that she will urge President Obama to veto H.R. 2583. Obama has no doubt already decided to veto the terrorism defunding bill if it passes both houses of Congress: the Obama administration has been sending more foreign aid to the Palestinian Authority than any past president, as well as aid to Hamas-controlled Gaza. And Obama promised $1 billion in loan forgiveness plus $1 billion in loan guarantees to the Muslim Brotherhood-influenced new Egyptian regime.
It is believed that the Democratic-controlled Senate will vote against H.R. 2583. (Moreover, the Senate version of a foreign affairs authorization bill, S. 1426, introduced by Democratic Senator John Kerry, contains no restrictions on sending foreign aid to governments that include terrorists or incite terrorism.)
Shamefully, there isn’t a single Democrat in either house of Congress who has supported Chairwoman Ros-Lehtinen’s sensible, much-needed bill.
But there's no chance that American Jewry will consider not voting Democratic in 2012, let alone vote Republican. None at all.
New York's Supreme Court (the lowest court in that particular state) has ruled that a lawsuit filed by residents of Sderot against the Bank of China should be allowed to go ahead.
Prosecutors say the BOC allowed Gaza terrorists to conduct wire transfers of several million dollars, beginning in 2003. The dollar transfers began with terrorist leaders in Iran and Syria, were processed by BOC branches in the United States. From there they were sent to accounts in Beijing, and from there funds were transferred to Gaza, Judea and Samaria.
The money was then used to fund terrorist attacks. Among those attacks were a suicide bombing in Eilat in 2007 that murdered three people and rocket attacks on the city of Sderot, in which several were murdered and many others left with life-long wounds.
Cash transfers continued despite requests from Israeli counter-terrorism officials, who demanded in early 2005 that China take action to stop the BOC from sending cash to Hamas and Islamic Jihad. The transfers continued until 2007.
More than 80 victims of attacks and their families are seeking both compensation and punitive damages. Their case was put forth by the Israel Law Center's Nitsana Darshan-Leitner, working alongside New York attorney Robert Tolchin.
The BOC had argued that the case was frivolous and that the BOC was not responsible for Hamas' actions. The defense later argued that if the case was allowed to go ahead, it should continue in China under Chinese law.
The court not only allowed the case to proceed, but said it can continue in New York. The BOC's decision not to seek a move to Chinese courts in a second case indicates that the bank will not find it unduly hard to continue with the trial in the United States, justices said.
The Dutch government has put the Turkish terror group IHH - which was responsible for the Mavi Marmara and other ships that attempted to breach Israel's legal blockade of Gaza last May - in its place, declaring the IHH a terror organization and blocking it from transferring funds out of Holland to Germany.
Dutch Foreign Minister Uri Rosenthal told The Jerusalem Post on Friday that he has “placed the [IHH Netherlands] on the Dutch list of terrorist organizations and froze its assets, because IHH Netherlands regularly transferred funds to IHH Germany. This organization is banned in Germany because it has raised funds for Hamas. Hamas has been on the EU list of terrorist organizations since 2003.”
He added that: “The decision to list IHH Netherlands was taken independently from the current plans to organize a new flotilla. The government is opposed to the flotilla.”
Asked about the slated May or June second Gaza flotilla action, Rosenthal told the Post, “The Dutch government believes that the second Gaza flotilla is countereffective to further opening of the regular border crossings.
Especially taking into account that the Dutch government is trying to advance the export of flowers and fruits from Gaza.”
Rosenthal noted that, “The Netherlands government has called upon organizations to refrain from participation in the Gaza flotilla since it will not help to improve the situation in Gaza. Under Dutch law, however, the government cannot prevent ships from setting sail.”
...
Yochanan Visser, an expert on Dutch-Israeli relations – who made aliya from the Netherlands in 2000, and is head of the organization Missing Peace – told the Post on Friday that the “The chairman [Groenhuijzen] of the Free Gaza movement in Holland is a convicted terrorist, who was a member of the Red Youth, an extremist organization modeled after the Rote Armee Fraktion in Germany, and has ties with the PFLP. He was sentenced to one-and-a-half years in jail for possession of arms in 1977.
“Officially he states that the aim of Free Gaza is to force Israel to abide by international law, but in reality his views are compatible to those of the IHH. He has reportedly admitted that providing humanitarian aid is not the aim of the second flotilla.
That leaves aiding Hamas and breaking the blockade as the real aims of Free Gaza Holland.”
E-mail queries to contact Groenhuijzen were not immediately returned.
Last week, a majority of the Dutch parliament voted to ratify a motion condemning the IHH flotilla as an action aimed against a friendly nation, and stated there are sufficient legal avenues to provide the Gaza population with humanitarian aid. The motion noted that second Gaza flotilla could be construed as aiding terrorist organizations.
A legislative effort is underway in the Dutch parliament to place the IHH on the European Union’s terror list.
British parliament okay with aid money going to Hamas so long as it can't be proven
Elder posts this exchange from the British parliament, which includes the following:
The Minister of State, Department for International Development (Mr Alan Duncan):... I do not share my hon. Friend’s conclusion. We are very careful how we spend our money in the occupied Palestinian territories and have done our utmost to support the legitimate government of Salam Fayyad with, I think, great success. We would abhor any money falling into the hands of extremists, and we do everything possible to ensure that such an accusation can never be verified or proved valid.
So it's okay for money to go to terror organizations like Hamas so long as it can't be 'verified or proved valid'?
I am an Orthodox Jew - some would even call me 'ultra-Orthodox.' Born in Boston, I was a corporate and securities attorney in New York City for seven years before making aliya to Israel in 1991 (I don't look it but I really am that old :-). I have been happily married to the same woman for thirty-five years, and we have eight children (bli ayin hara) ranging in age from 13 to 33 years and nine grandchildren. Four of our children are married! Before I started blogging I was a heavy contributor on a number of email lists and ran an email list called the Matzav from 2000-2004. You can contact me at: IsraelMatzav at gmail dot com
