According to reports in the Israeli media, the Trump administration transferred tens of millions of dollars to the Palestinian Authority to further security coordination with Israel.
By: World Israel News Staff
The Trump administration has reportedly rolled back a large-scale funding freeze instituted at the beginning of the year that stopped the flow of US aid dollars to the Palestinian Authority (PA).
According to a report in Haaretz quoting an American official, $61 million of the frozen aid money was transferred to the PA to facilitate counter-terrorism initiatives. Other sources familiar with the matter claim the sum was much lower, in the $35 million range.
The official told Haaretz that the funds were released to assist PA security force cooperation with Israel to stop terror and violence in Judea and Samaria.
The Trump administration has been universally boycotted by the PA since the president recognized Jerusalem as Israel’s capital in December and announced his intention to move the US embassy in Israel to that location, a move he carried out in May.
The US has withheld over $200 million in aid based on concerns related to Palestinian policies and the mandate to ensure that the use of the aid “meets [US] national security interests,” the State Department commented.
Under PA law, hundreds of millions of dollars each year are used to pay salaries to terrorists who committed heinous crimes against Israelis and stipends to the families of those killed committing terrorist acts.
While the US and Israel have enacted legislation conditioning the flow funds to the PA on its discontinuation of this longstanding practice, the PA President Mahmoud Abbas recently declared he would continue to make the payments with the PA’s “last penny,” even if it cost him his position.
Abbas is currently serving in the thirteenth year of what was supposed to be a four-year presidential term, with no election currently on the horizon for Palestinians.