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Sunday, September 12, 2010

Huge dropoff in Gulf aid for PA this year

From Reuters:
The United Arab Emirates has donated $42 million (27 million pounds) to the Palestinian Authority, boosting support for President Mahmoud Abbas' cash-strapped government as it embarks on direct peace talks with Israel, Arab officials said on Friday.

An Arab source in Washington said the donation, which was confirmed by a Palestinian government spokesman, was made after repeated calls by senior U.S. officials for more Arab support to help build Palestinian government capacity.
...

The Palestinian Authority's main Arab donors, Saudi Arabia and the UAE, have contributed considerably less this year than they have annually since 2007.

So far, the Saudis have donated $30.6 million until August, compared to $241.1 million in the same period in 2009. The new donation by the UAE, the world's third-largest oil exporter, is its first this year -- it gave $173.9 million in 2009.
That means that Saudi Arabia slashed its support for the PA by 87% this year, and the UAE by 75%.

Earlier this year, UNRWA mentioned that Arab nations have paid less that 20% of their pledges to that organization, a miniscule 1.5% of the UNRWA budget.

So apparently it is not just the PA that Arab nations don't care about, but Palestinian Arabs altogether.

Shouldn't people in the US and Europe be wondering why Arabs care less about their fellow Arabs than the West does?