Demonstrating its disregard for the White House’s wishes, a joint US Senate-House of Representatives committee barred the Bush administration from granting direct US aid to the Palestinian Authority (PA). The stipulation is considered a severe blow to PA chairman Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen)
The ban on direct aid is part of a budget supplement bill to finance US military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. The bill, which also includes budget items unrelated to these two areas, still requires approval from both houses of Congress in the coming days, but this will undoubtedly be forthcoming.
White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan criticized the decision, hinting that President George W. Bush may exercise his option to bypass the restriction, and grant the aid directly to the Abbas’s cabinet. McClellan said that the tight restrictions tie Bush’s hands in providing direct assistance to the PA ruling authorities.
The Bush administration asked Congress to allocate $200 million under the budget supplement bill, “in order to support political, economic, and security reform” in the PA, as Bush declared in the State of the Nation address in February.
The House-Senate committee approved the sum in full, but not as the PA had hoped. $50 million of the sum will be given to Israel for upgrading the passageways in the separation fence by installing high-tech equipment to expedite traffic through them, and improve the quality of life for Palestinians using the passageways.
The committee unexpectedly allotted to the Hadassah Medical Organization $2 million of the sum earmarked for improving medical services in the PA. $5 million will be used for “an independent audit” of the accounting procedures used in the PA. Most of the aid will be channeled to legally stipulated and well-defined projects consistent with the Bush administration request, but only through non-governmental organizations operating in the PA, not through the PA itself.
Published by Globes [online] - www.globes.co.il - on May 8, 2005