Iran's Ahmadinejad wants to debate Obama at UN

[Bravus]

The Israel-Palestine conflict is a never-ending round of 'they did it', 'no, they did it', that goes back about 3000 years, and can never be untangled. And you guys are basically just reprising that. There's only one way forward for the Middle East: someone becoming mature enough to realise that it doesn't matter who did it first. Peace can never come from retaliation. Peace can only come when someone looks forward instead of backward.

[bonnie]

Quote:

What would be interesting is to see some actual facts instead of propaganda.

Where Does Hamas Get It's Money. Perhaps you think this is propaganda as it is not written by a Palestinian but I find it rather interesting and not surprising

Contributors

Where Hamas Gets Its Money

Rachel Ehrenfeld, 01.16.09, 05:15 PM EST

The U.N., the E.U., the Gulf States, the U.S.--and Israel.

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Amid international condemnation of Israel, one would never guess that humanitarian aid and even cash is flowing into Hamas coffers, while its rockets continue to hit Israel.

It is important to alleviate the suffering of innocent Palestinians. However, since Gaza is under Hamas control, we have to ask: Will aid reach the suffering populace? If the past is any indication, most funds and supplies will end up with Hamas.

The world community that berates Israel for defending itself from constant attacks by the terrorist group also facilitated Hamas' victory in the 2006 Palestinian Authority election, when it was allowed to run under the name "List of Change and Reform."

Since then, despite repeated promises to cut off funds for Hamas, international aid organizations and many countries kept on sending money to Gaza, purportedly for humanitarian aid. The United Nations Relief and Works Agency, the U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees, raises money for Gaza through its Web site, with payments going through WorldPay (part of the Royal Bank of Scotland Group), the Arab Bank PLC in Gaza and HSBC in Amman, Jordan. Those funds come in addition to UNRWA's annual budget of $400 million.

The $7 billion to $10 billion that the Palestinian Authority has received since 1993 has come from the European Union, the U.N., the U.S., Saudi Arabia and other Arab League countries. France alone has sent more than $3 billion. This influx of cash has done little to advance the development of a viable Palestinian state or of peace in the region. Rather, it has helped to fuel the Palestinian leadership's terrorist agenda, and kept the Palestinian people oppressed and disenfranchised.

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In the mid-1990s--shortly after the Palestinian Authority came into existence--the Palestinian writer Fawaz Turki described the regime as "the dissolution of civilized society, of all civil norms and all hope." Despite all of this, most international organizations and the world community at large continue to ignore the ongoing human and civil rights violations perpetrated against the Palestinians by their own leadership, including the destruction of Gaza and the death of hundreds of its citizens.

In a meeting hosted by Abu Dhabi on Jan. 12, representatives from the Palestinian Authority and several donor countries, including Egypt, Britain and the U.S., met to discuss efforts to raise and send undisclosed amounts of money to help Palestinians in Gaza. The United Arab Emirates (UAE) also pledged to rebuild schools, mosques, hospitals and 1,300 damaged Gaza houses. In addition, the Emirates raised more than $87 million in a nationwide telethon on Jan. 9.

How would the money find its way to Gaza? "It is now the job of experts to funnel the cash," said UAE Foreign Minister Anwar Gargash. The experts do not have to look hard: They can funnel the money through the vast tunnel network that runs from the Egyptian border into Gaza. The Israelis have destroyed many of these tunnels, but enough remain through which to continue to smuggle cash and other supplies, including weapons.

The buildup of this underground complex sped up after March 2007, when the U.S. gave Egypt $23 million in special aid to stop underground smuggling into Gaza. Despite that apparent failure, on Friday, Jan. 16, under American and international pressure, Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni signed an agreement with U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, under which the U.S. will commit resources to help Egypt patrol the boundary.

Supplies and cash for Hamas have been pledged from all over the world, not merely from Iran, On Jan. 3, Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz donated $8 million of the more than $26.7 million raised in a national fundraising telethon for the "Relief of the Palestinian People in Gaza." Qatar, which pledged $50 million when Hamas was elected in 2006, promised to send more.

While condemning Israel, the European Union pledged more than $4 million in "humanitarian aid" to Gaza. In 2008, it provided Gaza with $55.6 million. In addition, European Union member states pledged more than $41 million, including $10.5 million from the British government's Department for International Development. Japan pledged $10 million, and terror-struck India said it would send $1 million.

http://www.forbes.com/2009/01/16/gaza-hamas-funding-oped-cx_re_0116ehrenfeld.html?loomia_ow=t0:s0:a41:g2:r4:c0.112430:b22656032&partner=loomia

[bonnie]

Quote:

The Israel-Palestine conflict is a never-ending round of 'they did it', 'no, they did it', that goes back about 3000 years, and can never be untangled. And you guys are basically just reprising that. There's only one way forward for the Middle East: someone becoming mature enough to realise that it doesn't matter who did it first. Peace can never come from retaliation. Peace can only come when someone looks forward instead of backward.

Carol seems to be of the opinion that the fault lies with Israel. Who started what under which bridge I don't know. I do know that being backed by terrorists probably isn't their wisest move. I have spent quite a bit of time researching as I had gotten curious as to the blame being laid at the feet of Israel.

One thing I have noticed is any information posted is propaganda,yet no factual information is forthcoming from those that blame Israel. I can find a few but most seem to be from Palestine its self or in several cases a communist web site. Hardly unbiased.

The most unbiased I found was wikipedia

I have found numerous websites that give detailed accounts of the tremendous aid to Palestine,aid even by the US.

Where has it gone and who has benfitted? How has it improved the lot of the Palestinian?

[bonnie]

I am seeing similar figures and statements is searching Palestine and Israel.

Carol, are all lying and what do you base that belief on?

Is it only Palestinian and communist reports that have the straight scoop?

The money to aid the poor Palestinian has gone where and how do you suggest other countries fix it

Can We Give To Gaza Without Giving To Hamas?

Claudia Rosett, 03.05.09, 12:00 AM EST

New U.S. and U.N. money for Palestine goes into a black hole.

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If stuffing billions worth of aid into the Palestinian territories could end Islamist terrorism out of Gaza, it might be worth the money. That seems to be President Obama's gamble, with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton jetting to a donors' conference in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, this past Monday, to chip in $900 million on behalf of U.S. tax payers. All told, more than 70 countries, cheered on by United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon, pledged a whopping total of $4.5 billion in fresh aid to the Palestinians.

The focus was largely on repairing damage to Gaza, after Israel's recent three-week battle to shut down mortar and rocket attacks out of the terrorist-controlled enclave. But, as Clinton described it, this is a nuanced effort. The broad aim is to bypass the Iranian-backed Hamas terrorists who control Gaza, and shovel resources for strictly humanitarian uses into the enclave "in coordination with" the Palestinian Authority, which is run by the U.S.-favored Fatah faction, Hamas' rival, based in the West Bank.

Thus the long and winding title for the Sharm el-Sheikh powwow: "The International Conference in Support of the Palestinian Economy for the Reconstruction of Gaza." Thus, also, the confusion and contradictory news accounts over how much of the multiple billions in aid will flow to the West Bank, how much to Gaza, when and how this will happen, and who will decide.

And so, despite a record which suggests that decades of aid to the Palestinians--bilateral, multilateral, you name it--have fostered not peace, but continuing violence, here we go again. The plan this time seems to be to flood the Palestinian Authority with funds that might somehow grease the way toward somehow easing Hamas out of the cockpit in Gaza.

Speaking of her aim to "foster conditions" to create a responsible, accountable Palestinian state, living in peace with Israel, Clinton pledged that America's $900 million in new aid to Palestinians--still to be approved by Congress--would include $300 million for Gaza. To blunt concerns that some of these taxpayer dollars might end up bankrolling Hamas, Clinton spelled out that "We have worked with the Palestinian Authority to install safeguards that will ensure that our funding is used only where, and for whom, it is intended, and does not end up in the wrong hands."

Good luck. The downside of this gamble, and the likelier scenario, is that this new multibillion-dollar wave of aid, pouring in from many sources, will boost Hamas. In case anyone needs a reminder, Hamas is an Islamist, terrorist group, spun out of the Egyptian Sunni Muslim Brotherhood but backed and trained these days by the Shiite mullocracy of terrorist-sponsoring Iran--which looks close to acquiring a nuclear arsenal. Hamas is dedicated in its charter to the destruction of Israel and hostile in its principles to western democracy.

Hamas was elected in 2006 by a Gazan population that five years earlier had celebrated the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on America by handing out sweets and dancing in the streets. Hamas consolidated its control over Gaza in 2007, kicking out Fatah in a bloody battle that included fighting in hospitals and apartment buildings, and both sides throwing prisoners off rooftops. Nor does Hamas mind putting Gaza's 1.5 million people at risk in order to pursue its terrorist "Death to Israel" agenda. Since Israel called a halt on Jan. 17 to its Operation Cast Lead, Hamas-controlled Gaza has continued to serve as a launching pad for attacks on Israel, firing more than 50 rockets, including 11 over the past weekend, one of them hitting a school in Ashkelon.

Were such attacks targeting, say, New York, one might hope they would be treated as terrorism and answered with force. But on Monday, the de facto reply of the "international community" to these assaults on Israel was to promise Gaza--already one of the developed world's top per-capita welfare clients--billions more in aid. Clinton, while making her pledge, and detailing rosy visions of the future, made just one ritual nod to the Hamas rockets of the here-and-now: "These attacks must stop." Expect more rockets.