Reasons for the palestinians’ dire economic situation is illustrated by a couple of news items that I have read over the past few days.
Firstly, the IMF has said that Arafat has diverted $1.35 billion of money earmarked for the palestinians to his own private accounts.
An audit of the Palestinian Authority has revealed President Yasser Arafat diverted $1.35 billion in public funds to a bank account he controlled, with most of the money later invested in Palestinian assets at home and abroad.International Monetary Fund official Karim Nashashibi credited openness and transparency in the Palestinian Authority’s accounting under Finance Minister Salam Fayad for disclosing the transfers of money between 1995 and 2000.
But Mr Nashashibi did not rule out the possibility of the remaining funds being misused.
He said there would be an audit.
This next article is also very telling. While bemoaning their poverty, palestinians are actively trying to have as many children as possible, so as to outnumber Jews in Israel (via WorldNetDaily).In the struggle between Israelis and Palestinians, Thuraya Eshbear wields a powerful weapon.
Babies.
At 35, this wisp of a woman has 13 children, from 20 years down to 10 months. Though she can’t afford to school them all, though she rarely has a minute to herself, she would gladly bear more.
“I have many children so that the Palestinian people will have more than the Israelis,” says Eshbear, a $37-a-week cleaner in the maternity ward of Gaza City’s biggest hospital. Here, on any given day, dozens of other Palestinian women are doing their part to ensure ultimate victory over Israel.
Admissions like this from the palestinians not only reinforce Israeli fears that the so-called “right of return” is a tool to destroy Israel demographically, but also provide an insight into how the palestinians themselves contribute to their dire financial predicament (besides blowing themselves up and necessitating the enforcing of curfews and roadblocks).
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David Lange
David Lange
