ENDING HATE- A WAY FORWARD FOR EU FUNDING OF PALESTINIAN EDUCATION

We were very honored to have with us today Lukas Mandl, an Austrian politician and a Member of the European Parliament (EPP group). and Marcus Sheff, the CEO of IMPACT-se, a research and policy non-profit that analyses textbooks and employs standards on peace and tolerance as derived from international declarations and resolutions to talk about Palestinian Education amd EU role in it.

If you hadn’t have the chance to join us you can watch the video of the event here:


Dutch parliament adopts motion to cut funding to the Palestinian Authority as long as it rewards terrorists

THE HAGUE—The Dutch Parliament has voted a motion calling on the government to cut 7% of Dutch funding to the Palestinian Authority.

MP Kees van der Staaij, from the Christian Reformed Political Party (SGP), had submitted a proposal to stop the financial contributions to the Palestinian Authority (PA), as long as it continues to reward terrorists.

The cut of 7% was chosen after monitoring group Palestinian Media Watch (PMW) provided the parliament with documentation showing that the PA spends 7% of its budget on payments to terrorists in jail and to families of killed terrorists (“Martyrs”).

The Dutch motion is binding unless the PA stops these payments.

Van der Staaij came to this motion after a conversation with terror survivor Kay Wilson. She pointed out that the Palestinian Authority indoctrinates Palestinians with hatred and that terrorists are rewarded by the PA for their crimes.

The PA recently added four new families of terrorists to its growing terror rewards payroll. One terrorist shot a pregnant woman, forcing an emergency delivery, but the newborn son died a few days later. Another terrorist murdered two of his Israeli coworkers. The other two terrorists were killed while attempting to kill Israelis. The families of the four terrorists will now receive monthly allowances for life.

In July 2014 following a previous presentation by PMW to Dutch MPs, the parliament voted 148-2 to cut funding to the PA if it continued paying salaries to terrorists. However, the cut never happened because the PA deceived Western donors by closing the Ministry of Prisoners’ Affairs and claiming the payments were made by the PLO from non-donor money.

When PMW exposed the PA fraud, in 2016, the international community was outraged. This led to the US Taylor Force Act, in March 2018, which conditions most of US aid to the PA, and to the Australian government’s decision, in July 2018, to cut all its direct aid to the PA. This is the first time since PMW exposed the PA’s deception in 2016 that a European country has legislated to cut funding because of the PA’s payments to terrorists.

The article was published on EJP


Peter and Paul

Robbing Peter to pay Paul. Many of us know this expression, but not its origin from 16th-century England, when part of the estate of Saint Peter’s Cathedral in Westminster was appropriated to pay for repairs to Saint Paul’s in London. That brief trivia titbit aside, the expression fits very well when it comes to EU funding of the Palestinians.

On Thursday afternoon, after much advocacy work from us at EIPA, and other groups such as the excellent Impact SE, the European Parliament budgets committee recommended a 15 Million Euro freeze in funding to the Palestinian Authority until it changes its school textbooks. Regular readers of mine will know that we at EIPA have done a lot of raising on this issue. It’s bad enough that many schools under Palestinian Authority control are named after terrorists who committed terrible atrocities, and that encourage pupils to emulate their life, but textbooks, funded in part by EU taxpayers, refer to Jews as liars, sinful, apes and pigs and utterly refuse to countenance the existence of the State of Israel. It doesn’t take much head scratching to figure out why the Palestinian population is completely unprepared for peace. How can they be when they teach their children, as part of the school curriculum to hate, and to believe in the falsehood that Israel is a fabrication, it doesn’t exist, and that martyrdom and resistance to the ‘occupation’ is the way forward?

So, when the news came out yesterday, our phones at EIPA HQ and whatsapp were running red. Is this true? Will the Commission accept the parliament’s recommendations? Finally, is the EU is starting to wake up?

Yes. Most likely (as under the co-decision procedure on budgets it can’t ignore parliament) And lastly, sadly no.

Sadly no? that’s a bit defeatist isn’t it? You and others actually got one of the EU institutions to put pressure on the PA and introduced conditionality on Aid, something that you have been banging on about for years now? Where’s the beef, Benjamin?

All fair questions dear reader. By the time you read this, it will be Strasbourg week (when the European Parliament decamps beside the Rhine to vote in plenary). On the agenda is UNWRA. As most of you know, the American administration cut its funding to the UN agency, which is unique as a refugee agency for exacerbating the very problem it is tasked to solve. Under its tenure UNWRA has seen refugee numbers rise from some half a million at its inception, to roughly 5 Million today. Think about it. That’s a bit like having a food aid programme that actually contributes to famine isn’t it?

Anyway, long story short, we knew what was coming. Late on Thursday, once the 15 Million had had its few hours in the news cycle, the office of Federica Mogherini announced that it was giving UNWRA 40 Million Euro to help bridge the gap in US funding to UNWRA.

Robbing Peter to Pay Paul. We might be stretching the analogy a bit here equating ourselves to the parishioners of St. Peters (and our Rabbis would probably have something to say about it too), but what sense does it make to cut PA funding in half on textbooks (good by the way, and long, long overdue), whilst simultaneously funding a UN body that keeps Palestinians trapped in a spiral of permanent refugee status, with little prospect of quality of life, under a terrorist dictatorship and which only underlines and compliments the very narratives that are expressed in the textbooks, and lead year after year to needless deaths, more hatred and more entrenchment?

Answers on a postcard please to EEAS HQ at Schuman Roundabout in Brussels if you figure that one out. Oh and post your answer in comments below please and spare my already raw scalp from further self-inflicted scratching abuse.

The Op-Ed was written by our director, Alex Benjamin and was also published in The Times of Israel


EU consults with Israel and the Palestinian Authority on its engagement in support of the two-state solution

European Commission Director General for Neighbourhood and Enlargement Negotiations, Christian Danielsson, and the Managing Director for Middle East and North Africa at the European External Action Service, Fernando Gentilini, will hold consultations this week with the representatives of the Government of Israel and the Palestinian Authority on the on-going review of modalities of EU engagement on the ground in support of a two-state solution.

The objective of the review is to ensure that all the modalities of the European Union’s engagement are as efficient and as effective as possible to advance the goal of a two-state solution, including in Gaza which, together with the West Bank, is an integral part of a future Palestinian state.

The EU remains firmly committed to the two-state solution as the only realistic and viable way to achieve a just and lasting peace between Israelis and Palestinians. The EU has a close partnership with Palestine as its largest and most reliable donor, and with Israel as its biggest trading partner. The EU wishes to hear the views and perspectives on the review from Israel and the Palestinian Authority, both of which benefit from the EU’s active engagement, and to raise and discuss with them any obstacles to peace and to the viability of the two-state solution.

Click here for the Press release


THE MONEY TRAIL The Millions Given by EU Institutions to NGOs with Ties to Terror and Boycotts against Israel An In-Depth Analysis

BREAKING NEWS SPECIAL – REPORT SHOWS HOW EU FUNDS ARE DIRECTLY SUPPORTING BOYCOTTS OF ISRAEL, AND WORSE…

The EU’s official position on Boycotting the State of Israel demonstrates in technicolour the murky side of consensus decision making. How do you reconcile the breadth of the political spectrum on this issue whilst keeping as many as possible in the tent? You concoct a phrase straight out of the newspeak playbook as a catch all. We paraphrase, but here is it:

“The EU is against all forms of boycott that seek to delegitimise, but BDS represents freedom of speech.”

Yes. It is an absolute crock of a sentence. With all the backbone of a jellyfish. But if you are going to construct such a crock, then it should at least be stuck to.

In breaking news this morning, solid and concrete data revealed for the first time in a detailed paper by Israel’s Ministry of Strategic affairs HERE:The Money Trail_English , shows that despite the catch-all lip service, the EU is directly and indirectly funding organizations – to the tune of over 5 million Euros, that promote, support and call for BDS activities. The paper list in detail where the millions were transferred to, directly from the European Union in 2016, to a number of organizations that promote delegitimization and boycotts against Israel. The information, sourced and freely available in publications and report on the websites of the EU and the recipient organizations themselves, also reveal that millions of Euros are coming to organizations through indirect financing through third parties.

According to the Ministry, “there is concern that European taxpayers’ money is finding its way also to those who maintain ties with terrorist organizations.”

As an example, one of the bodies that states that it enjoys direct EU funding is the Norwegian NPA (Norwegian People’s Aid). According to their own reports, in 2016 the organization received financial assistance from the EU amounting to 1.76 million euros. That same year, the organization published a report calling on financial institutions to withdraw their investments from companies operating in Israel.

The report also states that an American authorities investigation found that the NPA, which has also received American funding over the years, has links with terrorist elements. In 2012 and 2012, for example, the organization supported an empowerment project for Gaza youth, in which Hamas and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine – which, ironically, were recognized as terrorist organizations by the EU itself – took part.

The study also shows that EU funds also come indirectly to PCHR (the Palestinian Center for Human Rights). Linked to the PLO, the organization calls on the international community to impose “sanctions on Israeli settlements,” to incriminate those with whom it maintains trade relations and to terminate the special wage agreements between the EU and Israel.

There isn’t space here to list all the organisations involved, suffice to say what we have listed is the tip of a particularly embarrassing iceberg for the ‘good’ ship EU.

“It is inconceivable that taxpayers’ money in Europe comes to organizations that promote boycotts against Israel, some of which are connected to terror organizations,” said Israel’s Minister for Strategic Affairs Gilad Erdan.

We at EIPA fully understand the Minister’s incredulity at the findings. However, as regular readers will know, the issue of conditionality has been a central theme of ours, and we long suspected that the opaque EU funding structures were open to misuse and were not being managed properly. Yes, that is quite an accusation to make. But this ground-breaking report allows us to repeat it with even more certainty. And the trouble with newspeak, is that it only works when everybody believes it….

 

 


Statement by Spokesperson on the remarks by Palestinian President Abbas on the Holocaust

Statement by Spokesperson on the remarks by Palestinian President Abbas on Holocaust

The speech Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas delivered on 30 April contained unacceptable remarks concerning the origins of the Holocaust and Israel’s legitimacy. Such rhetoric will only play into the hands of those who do not want a two-state solution, which President Abbas has repeatedly advocated.

The Holocaust and World War Two have defined Europe’s modern history like no other event. Holocaust education remains central to building up resilience against all forms of hatred in our societies. Antisemitism is not only a threat for Jews but a fundamental menace to our open and liberal societies. The European Union remains committed to combat any form of anti-Semitism and any attempt to condone, justify or grossly trivialise the Holocaust.


2 French consulate staffers suspected of smuggling Hamas arms

French driver and Palestinian guard employed by the consulate in east Jerusalem arrested on suspicion of using a vehicle with diplomatic plates to transfer weapons from Hamas in Gaza to the West Bank.

Two employees of the French Consulate in east Jerusalem—a driver and his security guard—were arrested by Israeli authorities last month on suspicion of using a vehicle with diplomatic plates to smuggle weapons from Hamas in Gaza to the West Bank, the Shin Bet said Monday.

The consulate’s driver, Romain Franck, a French national, is suspected of using his diplomatic vehicle to transport some 70 handguns and two assault rifles.

A Palestinian guard employed by French authorities, a resident of east Jerusalem, was also arrested in the case, as well as several Palestinians from the Gaza Strip who were staying in the West Bank illegally.

Franck was part of a Palestinian network in the Gaza Strip, the West Bank and east Jerusalem that smuggled weapons from Gaza to the West Bank through the Erez border crossing.

The French driver smuggled arms on several occasions over the past few months, while taking advantage of his diplomatic vehicle, which was subject to less stringent security checks at the crossing.

Franck received the weapons from a Palestinian resident of Gaza who works for the “French culture center” in the strip. Franck then took the arms to a Palestinian man in the West Bank, who in turn sold them to arms dealers.

The investigation found that Franck had a financial motive and was acting of his own volition and unbeknown to his superiors. The investigation also found that several of the Palestinians arrested in the case were also involved in the smuggling of money from Gaza to the West Bank.

The investigation was carried out in coordination with the Israeli Foreign Ministry and while keeping French authorities constantly updated.

A total of nine suspects have been arrested in the case so far. Indictments will be filed against six of them on Monday.

The French embassy in Israel said on Monday it was cooperating with Israel in the investigation. “We take very seriously this case … and we work very closely with the Israeli authorities on this matter,” said an embassy spokesman, who declined to comment further on the allegations against the staffer, a French citizen.

According to his Facebook page, Franck, who is from Lambersart in the north of France, arrived in Jerusalem in January 2017. “It’s the big day, starting to a new adventure.. Thank you for everything that accompanied me and supported in this new experience that begins!” he wrote at the time.

Later he posted many photos from the region, including from Petra and Aqaba in Jordan, the Palestinian Authority and the Jordan Valley.

An Israeli official called the incident “very grave,” but clarified it would not affect Israel’s ties with France. “We thank French authorities for the cooperation,” he said.

A senior Shin Bet official decried the “cynical exploitation of the immunity and privileges granted to foreign representatives in Israel to smuggle weapons… that could be used in terror attacks against Israeli citizens and security forces.”

The Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories, Maj. Gen. Yoav Mordechai, also slammed the “cynical and never-ending exploitation of humanitarian aid and international aid by the terrorist infrastructure.”

“This event only clarifies the need for a strict policy on granting (entry) permits,” he continued. “International bodies are required to carry out internal inspections to ensure aid goes to the residents of Gaza and not to terror.”

French lawmaker Meyer Habib, who represents French nationals living in Israel, the West Bank and Gaza, said, “Unfortunately, this isn’t the first problematic affair the French Consulate in Jerusalem has been involved in. And even if only junior staff were involved, there is a feeling, unfortunately, that the consulate has actually become the French Embassy to the Palestinian Authority.”

The article was published on Ynet


Does Europe Want Peace — or Political Relevance?

It looks like the EU is anxious to try and fill the US’ role as a peace mediator. From the EU External Action website:

Norway’s Foreign Minister Ine Eriksen Søreide and EU’s High Representative Federica Mogherini have decided to convene an extraordinary session of the international donor group for Palestine, the Ad Hoc Liaison Committee (AHLC).

There is an urgent need to bring all parties together to discuss measures to speed up efforts that can underpin a negotiated two-state solution.

Furthermore it is necessary to enable the Palestinian Authority to execute full control over Gaza, based on the Cairo agreement from 12 October 2017.

The meeting will be held in Brussels on 31 January 2018 at Ministerial level, hosted by the European Union and chaired by Norway.

The impression one gets from this is not that the EU particularly expects to gain any more traction towards peace than it has in the past 69 years. Instead, it feels like the EU sees an apparent vacuum created by the US — and wants to fill that vacuum by giving Palestinians more money, and by tacitly agreeing with them that Jerusalem belongs to them as a basis for negotiations.

In this case, peace isn’t the goal. In reality, the EU is using the conflict to make itself look more relevant.

Because if the EU wanted peace, taking Jerusalem off the table and admitting that the city is Jewish is the single most effective move that the EU could make towards pushing Palestinians to compromise — rather than insisting on acting like a victor that can impose its terms on the region.

The Article was Published on The Algemeiner


How Sweden supports terror against Israel

Swedish aid to Plestinian Arabs is not peaceful, to put it mildly. Supporting anti-Zionist plays that turn history on its head for unsuspecting Western audiences and calling it aiding culture, is a way to make peace unattainable.

In Sweden there is an ongoing discussion about whether Sweden is funding Palestinian terrorism or not. The truth is that Sweden supports Palestinian projects and NGOs promoting terrorism and violence. By doing so Sweden is in fact guilty of encouraging violence and extremism in the Palestinian society.The Swedish aid is not peaceful and we need to protest how it has been misused.

For years Sweden has, unfortunately, been promoting violence by funding NGOs which encourage violent resistance to the Israeli presence in the Middle East.

In Jenin, a town in the Palestinian controlled part of the disputed territories in Samaria there is a theatre called the Freedom theatre (TFT). The theatre very actively promotes BDS against Israel, glorifies terror and takes part in campaigns aimed against Palestinians who choose peaceful co-existence with the Israeli society.

Sweden supports TFT with hundreds of thousands of shekels every year. According to the theatre’s annual report of 2015 the Swedish government  payed salaries and student grants to the staff at the theatre for about  NIS 152 083 and supported  TFT with NIS 204 449 in total in 2015. In 2016 TFT received NIS 244 000 from Swedish funds. The money is transferred through PPAN a Palestinian BDS network which has been given over NIS 8 million from generous Sweden since 2016. This money cover the  TFT’s performances in Jenin’s refugee camp. And last year over 12 500 Palestinian children and adults watched its performances.

So what kind of plays does TFT perform that would promote Sweden’s official peaceful goals with development aid? Are these plays about peace, building bridges between people or ending violence?

No, no and no.

’The Siege’ is the title of one popular play TFT recently has been touring with in Palestinian towns and in  the US.

The play is based on an event that took place between April 2 and May 10, 2002, during which 39 armed terrorists occupied the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem, taking 200 civilians and 46 monks, even children, hostage. According to some testimonies the terrorists used pages in the Bible as toilet papers and kept the food in the church for themselves while the hostages starved.

The Palestinian terrorists booby-trapped the church with 40 bombs and threatened to blow the holy site up and kill the hostages. The terrorist later agreed to leave the church as they were promised to be sent to freedom in Europe and Gaza.

However in ’The Siege’ the terrorists are portrayed as action heroes defending their homeland.  Terrorists like Ibrahim Moussa Abayat contributed  their narrative to the script. He is also featured in the promotional video clip for the play.According to the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs Abayat was involved in shooting attacks and killings of several Israeli civilians. On the poster advertising the play an actor playing one of the terrorists is seen smiling posing with a rifle.

Another play TFT is performing is ’Return to Palestine’. The play centres around Jad, a Palestinian Arab, who grew up in the US. One day he travels to the ‘Palestinian territories’. According to the Palestinian Authority Maan News Agency in the end of the story Jad reaches the conclusion that the land needs blood and sacrifice for its survival and for a free life. In an interview with Maan News Agency, Shireen Jarrar, secretary of the board of directors of the Freedom Theatre, says that the play presents a very beautiful message to all expatriates. She also says that the message of the play carries an invitation to the Palestinian Arab expatriates to ”return and challenge all difficulties”.  The performance is funded not only by  Sweden but by the PA ministry of Culture.

‘Return to Palestine’? I call it an invitation to terror and violence as the main character of the play concludes that violence (blood and sacrifice) is the way forward.

Terror organizations like PFLP have met with TFT. In 2014 it met with the terror organization. During the meeting TFT staff revealed to PFLP that TFT not only graduates artists, it also graduates ”performing resistance fighters”. The younger generations in towns like Jenin who come to TFT shows will be encouraged to perform acts of violence and terrorism as TFT portrays Palestinian terrorism as heroic and its terrorists as poor victims.

Some prominent members of  TFT have a background in terror organizations.

Palestinian online newspaper Donia Al-Watan has interviewed the late TFT member Rabea Turkman,  who was a Fatah militant in the Al Aqsa martyrs’ brigades since the age of 16.

Al-Watan asked Turkman if the theatre is an alternative to armed struggle. His answer was that the theatre is not an alternative to armed struggle but a complement to that. He also added to his answer, that in all revolutions art has been a form of resistance, without denying armed struggle.

So TFT does not see its ”cultural resistance” as an alternative to armed activities, it is merely a complement to terror activities. The cultural resistance is not replacing the armed struggle  but rather serves as a tool to keep the people fed with the ideas of armed struggle and hostility towards Israel. In Europe and the US ”the Palestinian cultural resistance” has the goal to change our Western perspective of Palestinian terrorists from viewing them as terrorists to viewing them as victims, freedom fighters and heroes. The end goal is to make Israel lose support in Europe and the US.

Another member of the Al Aqsa martyrs’ brigades active in the theatre is one of its co-founders, Zakaria Al-Zubeidi. He is described in Palestinian media as a local leader of the Fatah armed wing.During the second intifada he was the terrorists’ bombmaker. But he is also the co-founder of the local branch of the Fatah armed wing in Jenin. TFT also reveals that Al-Zubeidi allegedly has been hiding 50 weapons. The theatre in addition to this states that staff, students, and board members have been arrested multiple times.

TFT also has cultural activities for children, which may look innocent on the surface. The ”soft” activities with small children however are there to create a positive image of TFT and to divert attention from TFT’s focus on graduating ”performing resistance fighters” and showing solidarity with terrorists.

TFT is just one of many many organizations Sweden is currently funding with millions of shekels from the Swedish tax payers’ money. Another organization is the anti-Semitic Miftah which until just recently made neo-Nazi material available on it’s webpage (now removed). Miftah has also been promoting violence in its contests for youths.Yet another organization Sweden funds is the Abu Dis Youth Club which honors acts of terrorism with championships and teams named after terrorists while hosting PFLP events inciting the youths to violence.

Sweden needs to wake up and realise that its foreign aid projects in the Palestinian territories are immoral and wrong. So on November 5I invite the Swedish tax payers to protest the irresponsible way in which Swedish development aid has been used. We will protest the government for inciting to violence with its destructive aid policy. For the very first time in history a demonstration against the Swedish government’s anti-Israel policies will take place in the heart of our democracy, outside the Swedish parliament.

May the truth liberate the Swedish people and ignite democratic resistance against Sweden’s immoral and destructive aid policy that creates terrorists instead of peacemakers.

Tobias Petersson is the director of Swedish think tank Perspektiv på Israel (Perspective on Israel)

The article was published on Arutz 7 website


Members of the European Parliament slam attempts to glorify Palestinian convicted terrorists by the Palestinian Delegation

17 Members of the European Parliament, from across the political spectrum, pushed back hard on a far left initiative by fellow MEPS who extended an invite to relatives of convicted Palestinian terrorists to address the Delegation for relations with Palestine. 

In a letter addressed to the President of the European Parliament, Mr. Antonio Tajani, the 17 signatories wrote “We are utterly appalled with the understanding that our colleagues from DPAL, under the pretext of discussing, ‘the situation of the Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails after the hunger-strike’, are in fact offering a public platform to relatives of convicted terrorists”. 

The letter, sent by EIPA political board President and Swedish MEP Lars Adaktusson, comes on the eve of the meeting in Strasbourg of Members of the European Parliament sitting on theDelegation for relations with Palestine (DPAL) and their guest speakers, Mrs. Fadwa Barghouti, wife of Marwan Barghouti,and Sumoud Saadta, daughter of Ahmad Sa’adat. 

The signatories conclude that the organizers of the hearing are blatantly ignoring “the Council Decision listing both the Popular Front for Liberation of Palestine (PLPF) and the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade as terrorist organisations”.

“We, Members of the European Parliament, are seriously concerned with the message this forum sends to our constituencies amidst such turbulent times in Europe”. 

“Given that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict involves a wide range of issues, we encourage our colleagues, who choose to show their support for the Palestinian self-determination, to engage with Palestinian actors pursuing peace, and not with convicted terrorists.” 

Teodora Coptil, head of relations with the EU Institutions at EIPA : “With a newly formed Committee on Counterterrorism, the European Parliament should vehemently enforce its rejection of any form of incitement and hate speech, and discipline its Members who are offering an official platform to PFLP and Al Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigade affiliates; such actions undermine the very core of European values and norms” 

Rabbi Menachem Margolin, the founder of EIPA, added: 

“Can you imagine what the reaction would be had the family of Osama Bin Laden would be invited to the European Parliament to express the motivation and supposed rationale of their terrorist relative? It is unthinkable. 

Yet this is precisely what the Delegation for Palestine sought to do.  We welcome the MEPs initiative to quickly move and raise their objections at this abhorrent move. It is now up to the President to ensure that this doesn’t happen.”

To read the letter and list of MEPs please go to the following link:
Letter_regarding the meeting agenda of the Delegation for relations with Palestine

 


Israeli government and Palestinian Authority agree to strengthen economic ties

Israel agrees to open Allenby Crossing for 24 hours a day, used by some 2.3 million people per year

The Israeli Minister of Finance Moshe Kahlon and Palestinian Prime Minister Rami Hamdallah agreed on Tuesday to strengthen economic ties between Palestinians in the West Bank and Israel.

Kahlon, along with the Defense Ministry’s Coordinator of the Government’s Activities in the Territories Major General Yoav Mordechai, held a meeting with Palestinian Authority officials in Ramallah in order to lay out a plan for economic and civil partnership.

During the meeting, which was the latest of a series of meetings between the two parties, Israel agreed to allow for the opening of Allenby Crossing on the Jordan-West Bank border for 24 hours a day within the coming months and, after 2018, for the crossing to be open permanently.

The opening of Allenby Crossing, which is controlled by the Israeli Airport Authority, will impact the some 2.3 million people who use the crossing each year, mostly Palestinians. The crossing is the only exit point for Palestinians between the West Bank and Jordan and is also used for the transfer of merchandise. Allenby Crossing is currently open on weekdays from 7:30am to 1:30am and on weekends, from 7:30am to 3:00pm.

Israel also agreed to allow the establishment of an industrial zone near the Tarqumiya crossing.

Both sides agreed to strengthen economic cooperation between the Palestinian Authority and the Israeli government moving forward. The meeting was conducted with the knowledge of the Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Israeli Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman.

The article was posted on I24news


WHILE EU CONTINUES TO FUND HATE, LET’S NOT KID OURSELVES ON PEACE PROCESS

What were you like as an 8 year old? I can’t imagine most of you can remember, but I can be pretty sure it involved dolls or an action man/GIJoe type figure, a train or a shop set, coupled with seemingly unlimited amounts of energy in playing with friends and generally, as the saying goes “acting the maggot’.

It was, as it should have been for most of us, a time of innocence, and while we might have played cowboys and Indians, we never thought of actually hurting anyone.

There isn’t much that shocks me. I moved to Northern Ireland when I was sixteen, the IRA came to our house and held my mother and aunt at gunpoint to hijack our car, we knew families ripped apart by terrorism. I was involved in the Northern Ireland Peace Process for a number of years, and then my Jewish path led me to be an advocate for Israel. So similarly to Northern Ireland, when it comes to the sadistic and barbaric way and means that incited Palestinians find to kill, maim and injure innocent Israelis, I rarely flinch.

This week though was different. Army footage captured two figures on the Israeli side of the security fence at Migdal Oz, when the IDF sent out a team to intercept the pair, they found two 8 year old Kids armed with knives.

When questioned they admitted that they had been sent to kill Israelis.

IDF spokesperson Peter Lerner, talking to the media, said,“When two, eight-year-old children are sent on a mission to attack Israeli civilians it is clear that the hateful rhetoric that echoes within Palestinian society abuses the most vulnerable of minds,”

I couldn’t agree more. Let us remember (as if we could ever forget) that so far in the year-long wave of terror attacks that has killed at least 34 Israelis and injured dozens, some of the terrorists carrying out stabbing attacks were as young as 11 or 13.

But 8 is a new, tragic and stomach churning low. Maybe I’m being overly sensitive, maybe it’s because my wife is due to give birth in two weeks, but this barely reported incident really struck me.

I’m director of a pro-Israel advocacy group here in Brussels, and I’ve been saying what I’m about to tell you so often to Members of the European Parliament and their advisors, that I’m beginning to sound like a broken record. But I promise you I will never stop saying it:

What hope of peace is there when your supposed partners are incited to such a degree that they will send 8 year old children to kill indiscriminately? What hope of peace when the Palestinian population is constantly fed a narrative that Jews, Israelis, are scum, pigs, dogs, apes, rapists, cockroaches that must be killed, and constantly resisted? Whose ‘filthy feet’ are a desecration? That every drop of Palestinian blood spilt in Jerusalem is “pure”?

The worst part is that us, the population of Europe, we the taxpayers’, are paying for this murder provoking rhetoric.

That’s not an exaggeration. The EU is the largest supporter of the Palestinian authority in the world. Over the years Mahmoud Abbas and his hate preaching acolytes have received Millions and Millions in direct EU aid.

Is this aid conditional on a rejection of incitement to violence? Does the EU say we will only fund you if you stop supporting violent acts, stop praising them and embracing the perpetrators as martyrs? Has it ever, like the US congress did, turn the funding tap down significantly when Mr Abbas made his ‘filthy feet’ comment?

That would be a big, fat, and in our opinion, utterly shameful, NO.

The PA know that whatever they do and say, they get their millions in pocket money regardless.And that can’t be right can it? That’s why I have made it my organisation’s priority, through the establishment of a European Parliamentary Working Group, to look at the whole issue of how EU funding can and should be made conditional on a commitment – to borrow from the Northern Ireland Peace process playbook – to exclusively peaceful and democratic means.

That means no incitement. That means laying the ground with your population and preparing them for peace. That means an end to language that dehumanizes.

And above all it means that sending two incited 8 year old kids with knives to stab and not even condemning it carries a heavy political price.

Until that happens, let’s not kid ourselves that there can be a meaningful peace process.

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Is there a dark side to EU funding?

 

On July 12, EIPA, MEP Fulvio Martusciello and MEP Artis Pabriks hosted a hearing on conditioning EU AID going towards the Middle East. The hearing was entitled: “Is there a dark side to EU AID? Building safeguards and ‘conditionality’ for EU funding in the Middle East.”

The hearing also saw EIPA formally launch a Cross Party Working Group on EU AID in the MENA region. The Working Group is looking at building in ‘conditionality’ when it comes to EU funding in the Middle East.

‘Conditionality’ in plain English means that funding can be cut or stopped entirely when recipients directly promote or incite violence.

MEP Pabriks, who chaired the hearing, focused on the impact that conditionality would bring to EU Aid. A strong advocate of EU soft power, he underlined the importance of EU Aid in bringing peace to the region. However, it can’t be done without controls from elected officials of the EU he added.

Mr Hans Gustaf Wessberg, the Swedish member of the European Court of Auditors (ECA) explained the role of the ECA in the funding process,  focusing on the auditing methods used in monitoring and assessing the efficacy and impact of the Aid programs on the ground.

Mr Wessberg himself personally led an audit team to the West Bank. His team went to Gaza but for security reasons he was advised not to go. The Court of Auditor’s report can be found HERE. The ECA found several irregularities, notably that EU funds are paying wages to PA officials in Gaza that are not working. 

He concluded his presentation by stating that “The commission has not made sufficient use to leverage reforms in the civil area”, and that “conditionality should be used more”.

The third speaker was EIPA’s Director Alex Benjamin. His presentation gave the audience an overview of how EU funds are currently being used by the PA. The Palestinian Authority set up a Martyrs Fund, that pays the families of terrorists that have killed Israelis.

Many schools are also named after those terrorists, inciting the children to follow their example.

Members of the EU Parliament that attended the event were very interested and an Q&A followed the presentations.

The Working Group will meet for the first time this autumn.