How America Finances the Destruction in Gaza—and the Cleanup - Mother Jones

[flamingdem]

http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2014/07/israel-gaza-united-states-assistance-unrwa

It's a racket for construction firms, for sure "US taxpayers are in an absurd place: They are partly paying for the Israeli military action in Gaza and funding the cleanup."

-- snip

According to the UNRWA, 75 of its facilities in Gaza, including schools and warehouses, have been damaged in the fighting. Presumably, some of the $15 million being sent to the agency by the United States—which covers a quarter of an emergency appeal for $60 million issued by the UNRWA—will be used to repair or replace UNRWA installations destroyed by the US-funded Israeli military.

The new package of US assistance includes $3.5 million in funding for Mercy Corps, Catholic Relief Services, and other nongovernmental organizations. According to the State Department, Mercy Corps will use some of this money to supply non-food items to displaced Palestinians and extend a short-term employment program for 3,000 people in Gaza and a "psycho-social support program" assisting about 2000 families. Catholic Relief Services will provide medical supplies and fuel for medical facilities.

The United States, according to the State Department, is UNRWA's largest donor, and has provided over $265 million to the agency this year to help Palestinian refugees in Gaza and other regions of the Middle East, including $9 million for the construction of new schools and distribution centers in Gaza. A US taxpayer might wonder if in recent days any of those schools—or students attending them—have been struck by an Israeli missile subsidized by the United States.

[PDJane]

1. Israel is a creation of Britain, but the Frankenstein monster is owned by America

[flamingdem]

2. Yes indeed

and the US taxpayer foots the bill.

Now if that message got out loud and clear maybe things would change.
That or less profit to be made.

[obama2terms]

3. I have thought for a long time

That the U.S. should cut off aid to Israel and any other country involved in this conflict. If they want to kill each other and cause destruction to each others property they can do it on their own dime! And I'm Jewish. I'm just sick of seeing the fighting for all of these years. I have nothing against Palestinians or Muslim people at all, and most Jews aren't Islamaphobic. But I can tell you this, BB Netanyahu is part of the Likud party, which is a right wing party in Israel with strong nationalist views, the party opposes the establishment of a Palestinian state no matter what the circumstances, the Likud party also supports the settlements in the West Bank and Gaza, in 2005 when Ariel Sharon ( now former prime minister of Israel, former minister of foreign affairs, former minister of housing and construction, and former minister of energy and water resources) actually went behind his party's back and carried out the Gaza disengagement plan, which withdrew Israel from the Gaza strip, the settlements were destroyed there and the settlements in the northern western bank were destroyed too.

After this he and the people who supported him left the party and formed the Kadima party ( basically a moderate faction of the Likud party primarily made up of Likud defectors) and for a while the Kadima party was the largest in the Knesset, and when the Likud party went into power it became an opposition party for the first time, they didn't do so well in the 2013 election the Kadima party only won 2 seats. So what I am trying to convey here is, BB is a right wing nut. Think about this, if the U.S. was dealing with a similar conflict with say, Mexico and the people in charge of dealing with it all was the tea party and neo-con crowd. We would be in a pretty bloody conflict. Because that's what right wingers seem to enjoy, war over diplomacy. This might be a bad example but with Iraq you saw the government doesn't care what we as citizens think, they will go over our heads no matter what. That is what is going on between Israel and Palestine right now. This conflict is horrible for both sides. And I'm sure there are just average people trying to get by on both sides that want this to be over, but it won't be because you have Hamas on one side and a right wing government on the other that just loves to see the conflict go on and on and on and on and on. Nothing will change for anyone there until everyone gets their leaders in check.