So what do you guys think…In my opinion, Palestinians should take advantage of such opportunities as much as possible. An extra 700 million $ every year is lots of money for a small country like Palestine. Use this money effectively to improve your living standards, health care system and educational institutions. What is the point of lingering on to an unfruitful war which is not even balanced in terms of military weapons? Your enemy is so strong and you cannot defeat it by stones and couple of suicide bombings here and there. That is why in Islam, there is a great emphasis on TADBEER (wisdom).
Palestinians offered huge aid boost as a peace prize
December 23, 2004
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The visiting chief of the World Bank, James Wolfensohn, has told Palestinians they can expect an extra $US500 million ($650 million) a year in aid if violence stops and there is progress towards peace with Israel.
The amount could be a huge boost for the donor-reliant economy, ruined by four years of violence, amid hopes of peace and recovery after Yasser Arafat’s death. At present outside funding runs at about $US900 million a year.
“Probably another $US500 million a year is needed and I believe that can be raised,” Mr Wolfensohn told a news conference on Tuesday. “I think it’s only available if there is confidence built on both sides and for the international community.”
Mr Wolfensohn met Israeli and Palestinian leaders to look at how to encourage recovery in the post-Arafat era. It was his first visit to the Middle East since the outbreak in 2000 of a Palestinian revolt that, together with Israeli military clampdowns, has undone economic progress made in years of relative peace and plunged most Palestinians into poverty.
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AdvertisementThe death in November of Mr Arafat, shunned by Washington as an alleged obstacle to peace, and the rise of the veteran moderate Mahmoud Abbas to succeed him have revived Middle East diplomatic and rebuilding efforts.
Mr Wolfensohn held talks with the Israeli Prime Minister, Ariel Sharon, and on the Palestinian side with Mr Abbas; the Prime Minister, Ahmed Qurie; and economic officials.
To the Israelis, Mr Wolfensohn emphasised the need to stop restricting movement of Palestinian goods through closures of Palestinian areas - a tactic that Israel says is necessary for security.
Human rights groups and Palestinians say such measures amount to collective punishment of the roughly 3.6 million Palestinians living in the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip.
Mr Wolfensohn told the Palestinians they must combat militant violence to eliminate Israel’s reasons for imposing restrictions, to restore internal law and order and to create an environment that could attract investors.
“I think that each side is tired of killing,” Mr Wolfensohn said, pointing to signs he saw as optimistic such as Palestinian elections planned for next month and Israel’s plan to evacuate Jewish settlements in the Gaza Strip and parts of the West Bank.
Opponents of the Gaza Strip pullout sparked outrage on Tuesday for invoking the memory of the Holocaust by wearing orange Stars of David on their shirts as a mark of protest.
Many settlers equate Mr Sharon’s plans to evacuate the settlements next year with the Holocaust in which 6 million Jews were killed by the Nazis.
Jews were made to wear yellow stars by the Nazis, but the settlers plan to wear orange ones to denote the colour of the Gaza Settlements Council and the campaign against disengagement.
The idea has angered many Israelis. Avner Shalev, chairman of Yad Vashem, the Holocaust memorial centre in Jerusalem, said it
“perverts the historical facts and damages the memory of the Shoah [Holocaust]”.
“It is important that the memory of the Shoah remain a unifying factor in Israeli society, not the opposite.”
Lawyers for victims of attacks by Palestinian militant groups have filed a suit in the US against a prominent Middle Eastern bank, saying it knew or should have known that its accounts were being used to funnel money to Palestinian suicide bombers and should be forced to pay damages.
The suit against Arab Bank was filed in federal district court in New York on behalf of nearly 700 victims and their survivors of attacks in Israel, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. The plaintiffs are from Israel, the US and 10 other countries.
Reuters, The Guardian, Los Angeles Times