"War is a dream, peace is a nightmare." This statement was made by the chairman of the Palestinian Authority (PA), Yasser Arafat, on June 6, 2001 in an interview with Radio Palestine. It vividly explains both the Intefada that followed, and the continuing bloodshed in the Middle East. It also illustrates Mr. Arafat’s vision for the future of the Palestinian people and the region.
To facilitate this vision, the Palestinian Authority, under Arafat's leadership, has consistently misused and abused international aid -- aid entrusted them by the international donor community and intended for the Palestinian people. This, in turn, has allowed Arafat to expand his political control, and his grip on the Palestinian Authority's pursestrings.
Just two weeks ago, both CBS and the BBC carried "exposes" of the Chairman’s own misuse of PA monies. The activities listed in these broadcasts included the diversion of at least $1.3 billion to his personal bank account and that of his wife, as well as the ordering of payments of some $50,000 to members of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade terrorist organization, part of his Fatah party of the PLO.
This information, however, is not new. It has, for quite some time, been known to anyone who followed Arafat and the corruption of, and in, the Palestinian Authority. Most of the evidence comes from the PA’s own documents, captured by the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF), and now found online at the website of the Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center at the Center for Special Studies (www.intelligence.org.il).
These exposes -- in which Palestinian former officials publicly admitted to a global audience Arafat’s corruption and that of the PA -- can be interpreted as a signal to Mr. Arafat to relinquish power so that the reforms of the Palestinian Authority can be accomplished.
The IMF report: "Economic Performance and Reforms under Conflict Conditions," which was released last September in Abu Dhabi, concluded that 8% of PA budget is being spent by Arafat at his sole discretion. The report also concluded that $900 million in PA revenues "disappeared" during the period between 1995- 2000, and that the 2003 budget for Arafat's office which totaled $74 million, had $34 million missing because they were transferred by the chairman to pay unidentified "organizations" and "individuals."
Historically, the PLO has had nine principal sources of income:
Official contributions from Arab states The Palestinian Liberation Tax Fund, a 3.5 to 5 percent tax on the income of all Palestinians worldwide Donations from wealthy Palestinians and international organizations such as the UN and the EU Support from charitable organizations Income from legitimate and illegitimate investments "Protection" charges paid by companies and states in order not to have terrorist acts directed against them Illegal arms deals Fraud, money laundering, counterfeiting, and other criminal activities Drug trafficking
The total amount of wealth accumulated by the PLO from its inception until the Oslo Accords has been estimated by a variety of sources. In 1990, the CIA estimated that the PLO had a fortune of between eight and fourteen billion dollars. In 1993 and 1994, the British National Criminal Intelligence Services estimated that they had about ten billion dollars. The British report also noted that the PLO was, in fact, the wealthiest of the world’s terrorist organizations.
The six billion dollars that the PA has received since 1993 has come from the EU, the UN, the US, Saudi Arabia and other Arab League countries. It has done little to advance the development of a viable Palestinian State, or of peace in the region. Rather, this has helped to fuel the Palestinian leadership’s terrorist agenda, and kept the Palestinian people oppressed and disenfranchised. In the mid 90’ - shortly after the PA came to power - the Palestinian writer Fawaz Turki described the regime as "the dissolution of civilized society, of all civil norms, and all hope."
Footnote:
This week, the International donor community has been gathered in Rome to approve another contribution of $1.2 billion to the Palestinian Authority for the 2004 budget. The United States, Japan, the European Union and Norway, are the biggest contributors, joined by the Arab League countries and the International Monetary Fund. In the meantime, the World Bank last week granted it $15 million, and the European Union gave $40 million more in assistance to the PA for "reforms and emergency economic aid." But giving any money to the PA before it fully accounts for the more than $6 billion already has received in aid since 1993 could facilitate the ongoing PA terror activities
