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Donors Give Abbas 7.4bn..Gaza cries
Related to country: Palestine

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PARIS — International donors pledged on Monday, December 17, billion of dollars to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and his West Bank government, while charities and UN agencies warned that Gaza Strip was on the brink of collapse.
"Without this support, without the payment of aid that will allow the Palestinian treasury to fulfill its role, we will be facing a total catastrophe in the West Bank and Gaza," Abbas told the one-day Paris donor conference, Reuters reported.

His Prime Minister Salam Fayyad asked donors for $5.6 billion by 2010, including $3.9 billion in direct support to the budget, to jumpstart a near-collapse Palestinian economy.

"To make this vision reality, we need your financial, political and moral support," said Fayyad, a West-favored economist appointed by Abbas after sacking elected premier Ismail Haniya following Hamas takeover of Gaza in June.

French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner said the donors have pledged $7.4 billion for Abbas and his government.

The US announced a donation of $555 million for 2008, saying the pledge was a "vote of confidence" in Fayyad's government.

The European Commission pledged $650 million in aid for 2008, while Britain announced a three-year aid package of up to $490 million.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy pledged $300 million in immediate aid while Sweden offered $300 million in 2007 and 2008.

Germany pledged $200 million and oil-rich Saudi Arabia $450 million.

The one-day conference brought together representatives of more than 90 countries and organizations.

Waste

International aid and money-lending groups questioned the benefit of the record aid package, with very little expected to trickle down to the most vulnerable Palestinians due to crippling Israeli restrictions.

"Though the generosity of the donors and the extra aid money is always welcome, it is being poured into a leaking bucket," Oxfam's Middle East director Adam Leach said in a statement.

The development charity said aid efforts already in place were being seriously hampered by Israeli restrictions on movement.

"The challenge is to fix the leak, not pour faster…Due to Israel's movement restrictions and the blockade of Gaza, millions of dollars of aid for Palestinians are being lost."

Leach stressed that ending these restrictions is "the only way" to make the money pledged count.

Béatrice Mégevand-Roggo, the International Committee of the Red Cross head of operations for the Middle East and North Africa, echoed the same message.

"The measures imposed by Israel come at an enormous humanitarian cost, leaving the people living under occupation with just enough to survive but not enough to live a normal and dignified life."

The ICRC said in a report released on Friday, December 14, that the dignity of the Palestinians was being trampled underfoot by Israel's harsh security measures.

Despite receiving $10bn in international funds since 1993, Palestinians are getting poorer and 65 percent live below the poverty line.

The situation is particularly dire in Gaza Strip, which has been suffering a total closure of its borders by Israel and Egypt since Hamas takeover.

Israel has since tightened already tough restrictions, banning nearly all exports, limiting imports to humanitarian goods and slashing the amount of fuel supplied to the walled-off enclave.

The Israeli closure has cost some 80,000 Gazans to lose their jobs, according to the World Food Program.

The United Nations Development Program (UNDP) warned on Monday that Israeli restrictions are pushing the Gaza economy to the brink with production reduced to 11 percent of capacity down from 46 percent before June.

"The private sector in the Gaza Strip is on the verge of collapse with no scope for recovery unless the strict imposed closure regime on the Strip is lifted."

Politicized

Hamas, the Gaza rulers, slammed the Paris conference as conspiracy to divide Palestinians.

"We support all forms of aid, financial or otherwise, to the Palestinian people. But the Paris conference is coating poison with honey and is a dangerous conspiracy," spokesman Fawzi Barhum said in a statement.

He charged that the real purpose of the meeting was to further divide Palestinians by rearming Abbas.

"We completely reject politicized money tied to American and Western agendas, which is a direct interference in internal Palestinian affairs," Barhum said.

"Abbas is cozying up to the Zionist enemy and the American project in exchange for millions of dollars to strengthen his security forces for his own personal interests."

Hamas, which won a majority in the 2006 parliamentary elections also slammed a French proposal for an international force to deploy in the Palestinian territories.

"This suggestion comes in the context of a declared war against the Palestinian people and against the Hamas movement," Barhum said.

"This is a new plan to destroy the democratic choice of the Palestinian people."




December 17, 2007 | 5:41 PM Comments  0 comments

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