On Tuesday, the state department under
President Donald Trump announced it would review one of Barack Obama's final
acts as US president — the release of $221 million to the Palestinian
Authority.
Obama's move
came as a shock to many, as the funds had congressional holds on them, which
don't legally bind the president but have historically been respected.
"I was
tracking President Obama's 11th-hour moves on the Palestinians, and this issue
never came up once ... Most analysts and observers didn't think Obama would or
could do this," Dr. Jonathan Schanzer of the Foundation for Defense of
Democracies told Business Insider.
But the $221
million represents just a portion of the total, regularly scheduled US aid to
Palestine, which totaled $557 million from all US government agencies in 2015.
"The US
and Israel both fund the Palestinian Authority because its stability contributes
to Israeli security," Michael Koplow, a Middle East analyst at the Israel
Policy Forum, told Business Insider.
"The
reason that the West Bank has not turned into a haven for terrorism and a
launching ground for rocket attacks, in contrast to Gaza, is because of the
robust security cooperation between the Israeli Defense Forces and the
Palestinian Authority security forces. The IDF and the Israeli government are
the biggest lobbyists of Congress in favor of continuing Palestinian aid,"
said Koplow.
According to
Koplow, though the Israelis and their supporters in the US may condemn the
Palestinian Authority and their actions, they continually fund and prop up the
organization for a lack of a better alternative.
"Should the PA collapse, the scenarios range
from the Israeli military having to reenter the entirety of the West Bank to a
complete Hamas takeover. Both the US and Israel are willing to put up with and
fund Palestinian Authority corruption, ineffective government, and incitement
in order to ensure the security cooperation that safeguards Israeli
security," said Koplow.
However, a
few GOP lawmakers decided to draw the line on the $221 million Obama intended
to send to the PA.
Two GOP
lawmakers Ed Royce of California, the chairman of the House Foreign Affairs
Committee, and Kay Granger of Texas, who sits on the House Appropriations
Committee, had placed holds on the funds as the Palestinian Authority had
pursued "a unilateral tract towards statehood and they were not trying to
work with Israel," said Schanzer.
Indeed, the
Palestinians have been making unilateral pushes for statehood, but the Israelis
had also pushed forward with initiatives that troubled the Obama
administration. The Obama administration made as much clear in December, when
the UN Security Council passed a resolution demanding that Israel stop building
settlements on Palestinian land.
The US
refused to vote on the resolution, effectively allowing it to pass.
Koplow said
Obama likely felt "frustration with Israeli settlement activity despite
repeated pleas from the White House and the State Department." This
frustration was "compounded to an unprecedented degree by the Israeli
Regulation Bill — which will legalize every unauthorized outpost and building
in the West Bank that are currently illegal under Israeli law," said
Koplow.
The bill has
only made it through the preliminary stages of Israel's legislature, but has
upset Washington and many in the international community nonetheless.
So while the
Palestinian Authority remains corrupt, and a sponsor of terror, the decision on
the Israelis part to attempt to barrel ahead with the settlements in the West
Bank and Gaza likely prompted Obama's decision to try to release the funds in
his final hours.
Meanwhile,
President Trump has repeatedly floated the idea of moving the US embassy in
Israel to Jerusalem, which PA President Mahmoud Abbas has urged against. His
administration will review the funding and possibly adjust it should it clash
with his strategy in the region, the Associated Press reports.
Source:
Business Insider
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