Shattered Hopes by Josh Ruebner

Author:Josh Ruebner
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Verso Books
Published: 2013-09-09T16:00:00+00:00

US AID TO PALESTINIANS

The Obama administration attempted to mitigate the suffering of Palestinians living under Israeli military occupation by increasing bilateral US aid to Palestinians, despite congressional efforts to end US aid to Palestinians as a sanction for their attempt to secure UN membership. In fact, during Obama’s first term in office, the United States raised aid to Palestinians by an even greater percentage than it did for Israel, although US aid to Palestinians still paled in comparison to US military aid to Israel. During the four regular budget cycles in President George W. Bush’s second term, the United States provided $957.6 million in bilateral aid to the Palestinians. In addition, the United States appropriated $624.9 million of support to the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) for Palestine Refugees, an agency which provides for the humanitarian needs of some five million registered Palestinian refugees in refugee camps in the Palestinian West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza Strip, Jordan, Lebanon and Syria. In total, the United States provided approximately $1.58 billion in aid to Palestinians during these years.

In June 2009, Congress passed a supplemental appropriations bill that included $660 million in US bilateral aid to the Palestinians, plus $119 million to support UNRWA. This total aid package of $779 million represented the vast majority of the $900 million dollars pledged by the Obama administration during a March 2009 international donors’ conference in Egypt convened after Operation Cast Lead. In addition, in the four regular budget cycles of Obama’s first term, Congress appropriated (2010–12) or is considering appropriating (2013) $1.98 billion in US bilateral aid to the Palestinians. From 2010 to 2012, the Obama administration also provided or plans to provide UNRWA with $713 million (since US funding of UNRWA comes from a portion of the overall funding for worldwide Migration and Refugee Assistance, the State Department does not request specific amounts of money for UNRWA, making the 2013 anticipated expenditure for UNRWA unknown as of this writing). In total, the Obama administration will likely provide more than $3.47 billion in aid to Palestinians in its first term, or more than double the amount of aid during President George W. Bush’s second term.22

At first, it may appear that this quantifiable rise in US aid to Palestinians under the Obama administration represented an increased commitment by the United States to help prepare Palestinians for the future establishment of an independent Palestinian state. After all, many of the programs funded by the United States are meant to improve socioeconomic indicators, develop infrastructure, professionalize governing and security institutions of the Palestinian Authority (PA), and promote the rule of law and democracy. In their design and impact, however, many US aid programs that supposedly benefit Palestinians actually entrap them into Israel’s seemingly never-ending military occupation, thereby perversely reinforcing the Israeli-Palestinian status quo that Obama has deemed to be “unsustainable.” By briefly examining each component of US aid to Palestinians, it is possible to outline this admittedly counterintuitive claim.

The largest component of the US bilateral aid

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