The Daily Mail has revealed a well known fact: the Europeans are indirectly paying brutal Palestinian terrorists and, by doing so, are generating further attacks against Israelis.
Thousands of Palestinian terrorists, including masterminds of suicide bombings and murderers of women and children, are given cash handouts by the United Kingdom, the Daily Mail revealed Sunday.
A two-month global investigation by the British media outlet has revealed that in Judea and Samaria and Gaza, “despite promises by the ruling Palestinian Authority (PA) to end the practice of paying aid money to convicted terrorists … [have] simply duped the West by allowing the Palestine Liberation Organization to hand out the cash instead.”
Britain gives £72 million ($101 million) a year to the Palestinians, according to the report. “More than one-third of which goes straight to the PA,” which “openly admits supporting terrorists whom it hails as heroes for fighting illegal occupation, awarding lifetime payments that rise depending on time spent in jail and the seriousness of crimes.”
One example is a Hamas “master bomber” Abdallah Barghouti, who was given 67 life sentences: he has received a total of £106,000 ($150,000). UK funds also pay out “salaries” to the families of suicide bombers, as well as to “teenagers involved in the latest upsurge of deadly attacks on Israel.”
The UK government’s Department for International Development (DFID) and the European Union (EU) “are still effectively supporting these payments to thousands of terrorists – despite claims to have ended such links two years ago,” the Daily Mail report says. This has been confirmed “by former prisoners and families receiving the cash, and in official statements by the PA.”
Furthermore, PA head Mahmoud Abbas used part of the UK gifts — £8 million ($11.31 million) — to build a palace in Ramallah.
The Sunday report included an interview with Ahmad Musa, a convicted Palestinian double murderer sentenced to life in prison, who was released from Israeli prison after five years, as part of Israel’s gestures to move along the “peace process.” He gets £605 ($855) every month. Others like him get much more, and after they die, the cash goes to their families. The money for these payments comes from British and European taxpayers.
Amjad Awad, who murdered Ehud and Ruth Fogel and their three children in 2011, has received an estimated £16,000 ($22,600) from the fund so far.
Amr Nasser, adviser to the PA minister of social affairs, told the Mail: “It is not a crime to be fighting occupation. These people are heroes. We could be giving them much more money and it would not be enough.” Nasser added that, when Palestine wins its independence, its government would seek reparations from Britain for its historic role in encouraging Zionism. “You should pay us more money,” he stated.
In February, British Member of Parliament Joan Ryan penned a letter to Prime Minister David Cameron in which she stated that British taxpayers’ money cannot be used to provide a “blank cheque” to the PA, and that she demands accountability on where the funds go to through an independent review of the funding.
Ryan, Chair of Labour Friends of Israel, said she was “disturbed” that the PA was glorifying terrorists in its schools and that its official television station propagated anti-Semitism. Ryan said a cross-party inquiry could determine how the money was being put to use.
By: JNI.Media and United with Israel Staff
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