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<h1 class="singlePageTitle"> How Most Aid to the Palestinians Ends
up in Israel’s Coffers </h1>
<span class="midColPostMeta"> Mar 8 2016 / 5:27 pm</span>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal"><strong><span class="" lang="EN-US"><span
style="color: #000000;">By Jonathan Cook – Nazareth<br>
<small><small><small><a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://www.palestinechronicle.com/how-most-aid-to-the-palestinians-ends-up-in-israels-coffers/">http://www.palestinechronicle.com/how-most-aid-to-the-palestinians-ends-up-in-israels-coffers/</a></small></small></small></span></span></strong><span
style="color: #000000;"><small><small><small><strong> </strong></small></small></small><br
class="ecxwebkit-block-placeholder">
</span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal"><span style="color: #000000;">Diplomats may
have a reputation for greyness, obfuscation, even hypocrisy, but
few have found themselves compared to a serial killer, let alone
one who devours human flesh.</span><span style="color: #000000;"> <br
class="ecxwebkit-block-placeholder">
</span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal"><span style="color: #000000;">That honour
befell Laars Faaborg-Andersen, the European Union’s ambassador
to Israel, last week when Jewish settlers launched a social
media campaign casting him as Hannibal Lecter, the terrifying
character from the film Silence of the Lambs.</span><span
style="color: #000000;"> <br class="ecxwebkit-block-placeholder">
</span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal"><span style="color: #000000;">An image of
the Danish diplomat wearing Lecter’s prison face-mask was
supposed to suggest that Europe needs similar muzzling.</span><span
style="color: #000000;"> <br class="ecxwebkit-block-placeholder">
</span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal"><span style="color: #000000;">The settlers’
grievance relates to European aid, which has provided temporary
shelter to Palestinian Bedouin families after the Israeli army
demolished their homes in the occupied territories near
Jerusalem. The emergency housing has helped them remain on land
coveted by Israel and the settlers.</span><span style="color:
#000000;"> <br class="ecxwebkit-block-placeholder">
</span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal"><span style="color: #000000;">European
officials, outraged by the Lecter comparison, have reminded Tel
Aviv that, were it to abide by international law, Israel – not
the EU – would be taking responsibility for these families’
welfare.</span><span style="color: #000000;"> <br
class="ecxwebkit-block-placeholder">
</span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal"><span style="color: #000000;">While Europe
may think of itself as part of an enlightened West, using aid to
defend Palestinians’ rights, the reality is less reassuring. The
aid may actually be making things significantly worse.</span><span
style="color: #000000;"> <br class="ecxwebkit-block-placeholder">
</span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal"><span style="color: #000000;">Shir Hever, an
Israeli economist who has spent years piecing together the murky
economics of the occupation, recently published a report that
makes shocking reading.</span><span style="color: #000000;"> <br
class="ecxwebkit-block-placeholder">
</span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal"><span style="color: #000000;">Like others,
he believes international aid has allowed Israel to avoid
footing the bill for its decades-old occupation. But he goes
further.</span><span style="color: #000000;"> <br
class="ecxwebkit-block-placeholder">
</span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal"><span style="color: #000000;">His
astonishing conclusion – one that may surprise Israel’s settlers
– is that at least 78 per cent of humanitarian aid intended for
Palestinians ends up in Israel’s coffers.</span><span
style="color: #000000;"> <br class="ecxwebkit-block-placeholder">
</span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal"><span style="color: #000000;">The sums
involved are huge. The Palestinians under occupation are among
the most aid-dependent in the world, receiving more than $2bn
from the international community a year. According to Hever,
donors could be directly subsidizing up to a third of the
occupation’s costs.</span><span style="color: #000000;"> <br
class="ecxwebkit-block-placeholder">
</span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal"><span style="color: #000000;">Other forms of
Israeli profiteering have been identified in previous studies.</span><span
style="color: #000000;"> <br class="ecxwebkit-block-placeholder">
</span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal"><span style="color: #000000;">In 2013 the
World Bank very conservatively estimated that the Palestinians
lose at least $3.4bn a year in resources plundered by Israel.</span><span
style="color: #000000;"> <br class="ecxwebkit-block-placeholder">
</span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal"><span style="color: #000000;">Further,
Israel’s refusal to make peace with the Palestinians, and as a
consequence the rest of the region, is used to justify
Washington’s annual $3bn in military aid.</span><span
style="color: #000000;"> <br class="ecxwebkit-block-placeholder">
</span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal"><span style="color: #000000;">Israel also
uses the occupied territories as laboratories for testing
weapons and surveillance systems on Palestinians – and then
exports its expertise. Israel’s military and cyber industries
are hugely profitable, generating many billions of dollars of
income each year.</span><span style="color: #000000;"> <br
class="ecxwebkit-block-placeholder">
</span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal"><span style="color: #000000;">A survey
published last week found tiny Israel to be the eighth most
powerful country in the world.</span><span style="color:
#000000;"> <br class="ecxwebkit-block-placeholder">
</span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal"><span style="color: #000000;">But whereas
these income streams are a recognizable, if troubling, windfall
from Israel’s occupation, western humanitarian aid to the
Palestinians is clearly intended for the victims, not the
victors.</span><span style="color: #000000;"> <br
class="ecxwebkit-block-placeholder">
</span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal"><span style="color: #000000;">So how is
Israel creaming off so much?</span><span style="color: #000000;"> <br
class="ecxwebkit-block-placeholder">
</span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal"><span style="color: #000000;">The problem,
says Hever, is Israel’s self-imposed role as mediator. To reach
the Palestinians, donors have no choice but to go through
Israel. This provides ripe opportunities for what he terms “aid
subversion” and “aid diversion”.</span><span style="color:
#000000;"> <br class="ecxwebkit-block-placeholder">
</span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal"><span style="color: #000000;">The first
results from the Palestinians being a captive market. They have
access to few goods and services that are not Israeli.</span><span
style="color: #000000;"> <br class="ecxwebkit-block-placeholder">
</span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal"><span style="color: #000000;">Who Profits?,
an Israeli organisation monitoring the economic benefits for
Israel in the occupation, assesses that dairy firm Tnuva enjoys
a monopoly in the West Bank worth $60 million annually.</span><span
style="color: #000000;"> <br class="ecxwebkit-block-placeholder">
</span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal"><span style="color: #000000;">Aid diversion,
meanwhile, occurs because Israel controls all movement of people
and goods. Israeli restrictions mean it gets to charge for
transportation and storage, and levy “security” fees.</span><span
style="color: #000000;"> <br class="ecxwebkit-block-placeholder">
</span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal"><span style="color: #000000;">Other studies
have identified additional profits from “aid destruction”. When
Israel wrecks foreign-funded aid projects, Palestinians lose –
but Israel often benefits.</span><span style="color: #000000;"> <br
class="ecxwebkit-block-placeholder">
</span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal"><span style="color: #000000;">Cement-maker
Nesher, for example, is reported to control 85 per cent of all
construction by Israelis and Palestinians, including the
supplies for rebuilding efforts in Gaza after Israel’s repeated
rampages.</span><span style="color: #000000;"> <br
class="ecxwebkit-block-placeholder">
</span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal"><span style="color: #000000;">Significant
segments of Israeli society, aside from those in the security
industries, are lining their pockets from the occupation. Para</span>doxically,
the label “the most aid-dependent people in the world” – usually
affixed to the Palestinians – might be better used to describe
Israelis.<span style="color: #000000;"> <br
class="ecxwebkit-block-placeholder">
</span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal"><span style="color: #000000;">What can be
done? International law expert Richard Falk notes that Israel is
exploiting an aid oversight vacuum: there are no requirements on
donors to ensure their money reaches the intended recipients.</span><span
style="color: #000000;"> <br class="ecxwebkit-block-placeholder">
</span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal"><span style="color: #000000;">What the
international community has done over the past 20 years of the
Oslo process – inadvertently or otherwise – is offer Israel
financial incentives to stabilize and entrench its rule over the
Palestinians. It can do so relatively cost-free.</span><span
style="color: #000000;"> <br class="ecxwebkit-block-placeholder">
</span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal"><span style="color: #000000;">While Europe
and Washington have tried to beat Israel with a small diplomatic
stick to release its hold on the occupied territories, at the
same time they dangle juicy financial carrots to encourage
Israel to tighten its grip.</span><span style="color: #000000;"> <br
class="ecxwebkit-block-placeholder">
</span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal"><span style="color: #000000;">There is a
small ray of hope. Western aid policy does not have to be
self-sabotaging. Hever’s study indicates that Israel has grown
as reliant on Palestinian aid as the Palestinians themselves.</span><span
style="color: #000000;"> <br class="ecxwebkit-block-placeholder">
</span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal"><span style="color: #000000;">The EU noted
last week that Israel not Brussels should be caring for the
Bedouin it has left homeless. Europe could take its own advice
to heart and start shifting the true costs of the occupation
back on to Israel.</span><span style="color: #000000;"> <br
class="ecxwebkit-block-placeholder">
</span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal"><span style="color: #000000;">That may
happen soon enough whatever the west decides, if – as even
Israel is predicting will occur soon – the Palestinian Authority
of Mahmoud Abbas collapses.</span><span style="color: #000000;"> <br
class="ecxwebkit-block-placeholder">
</span></p>
<p class="ecxMsoNormal"><i class=""><span style="color: #000000;">–
Jonathan Cook won the Martha Gellhorn Special Prize for
Journalism. His latest books are “Israel and the Clash of
Civilisations: Iraq, Iran and the Plan to Remake the Middle
East” (Pluto Press) and “Disappearing Palestine: Israel’s
Experiments in Human Despair” (Zed Books). He contributed
this article to PalestineChronicle.com. Visit: <a class=""
href="http://www.jonathan-cook.net/" target="_blank">www.jonathan-cook.net</a>.</span></i></p>
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