Israeli NGO Slams UN for Soliciting Money for Palestinian Aid as Terror Payments Continue
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by Algemeiner Staff and Agencies
Palestinians pass by the gate of an UNRWA-run school in Nablus in the West Bank, August 13, 2018. Photo: Reuters / Abed Omar Qusini.
An Israeli NGO has criticized the United Nations for soliciting $350 million to fund a humanitarian relief plan for Palestinians next year at the same time the Palestinian Authority is spending a similar sum on payments to terrorists and their families.
“Instead of the UN asking donor countries to contribute $350 million to provide for Palestinian humanitarian needs, the UN should be joining the unequivocal call from many governments that the PA immediately stop squandering the $355 million dollars of its own funds on its ‘Pay for Slay’ policy that incentivizes and rewards terrorism, and instead spend that money on needy Palestinians,” Maurice Hirsch and Nan Jacques Zilberdik, of Palestinian Media Watch, said. “Were the UN to adopt this basic and elementary moral requirement, it would strengthen the international forces that are mobilizing against the PA’s terror support.”
“Abolishing the ‘Pay for Slay’ policy would re-open the door for the PA to receive the approximately $215 million dollars of US aid to the PA withheld by the Taylor Force Act,” they added. “Abolishing the PA’s ‘Pay for Slay’ policy would also avert the imminent deduction by Israel of the PA’s expenditure on the salary program from the tax revenues Israel collects and transfers to the PA. Moreover, it would ensure that the PA would not lose its Australian funding and part of its funding from The Netherlands. As more international donors withdraw their funding due to the PA’s insistence on paying salaries to terrorists, it is obvious that the so-called Palestinian ‘humanitarian’ crisis is a self-imposed crisis, created by the PA and its leaders.”
The $350 million is being sought to implement the 2019 Humanitarian Response Plan — an outline of 203 projects to be carried out by 88 different groups, including UN agencies and NGOs.
The plan prioritized 1.4 million Palestinians most in need of food, healthcare, shelter, water and sanitation, said Jamie McGoldrick, the UN humanitarian coordinator in the Gaza Strip, West Bank and East Jerusalem.
“Humanitarian actors are facing unprecedented challenges, including record-low funding and a rise in attacks to delegitimize humanitarian action,” McGoldrick stated on Monday.
