Free Republic

December 17, 2007 by Steven Stotsky Foreign Aid and Palestinian Violence: An Uncomfortable Correlation Questions about Palestinian Aid Western leaders meet in Paris today to put the final touches on an extraordinarily generous aid package for the Palestinian government in the West Bank.  Israel, too, has in recent months agreed to turn over withheld tax revenue. The figures mentioned far exceed any previous aid promised to the Palestinians. Many commentators note the failure of economic aid in reducing Palestinian violence.   Statistics on Palestinian homicides and foreign aid to Gaza and the West Bank reveal that as aid increased to the Palestinian government, so...

WASHINGTON — U.S. government officials authorized giving nearly $1 million in foreign aid to a Palestinian university with links to the terrorist group Hamas, despite vetting the school eight times for ties to terrorism, according to a government audit. The audit concluded that the vetting process, initiated by the U.S. Agency for International Development and conducted by the U.S. Embassy in Tel Aviv, found no "derogatory information" on the Islamic University in Gaza between 2002 and 2006—even after Hamas claimed a parliamentary majority in Palestinian elections in 2006. Several times, university officials certified that they provided no material support for...

The principles of its constitution include the following: The Israeli existence in Palestine is a Zionist invasion. The Zionist Movement is racial, colonial, and aggressive in ideology, goals, organization, and method. Liberating Palestine is a national obligation… Liberating Palestine and protecting its holy places is an Arab, religious, and human obligation. Based on these principles, the constitution calls for: Complete liberation of Palestine, and eradication of Zionist economic, political, military, and cultural existence. And how is Palestine’s liberation to be achieved? Armed public revolution is the inevitable method to liberating Palestine. Absent the strong Islamic religious element, this constitution might...