The Trump administration recently released millions of dollars of frozen aid money to the Palestinian Authority (PA) but only for Israeli-Palestinian security cooperation the Times of Israel reported on Thursday.
While Washington says it will continue to review its assistance to the Palestinians it chose to allocate specific funds for the current fiscal year to specific PA programs that ostensibly serve American interests an official said.
“We recently decided to move ahead with FY2017 International Narcotics and Law Enforcement funding for Palestinian Authority security assistance and Non-Proliferation Anti-Terrorism Demining and Related Programs (NADR) in the West Bank” a State Department official said Thursday.
“This assistance underpins Palestinian Authority security cooperation with Israel which remains in force despite recent tensions” the official added. “This decision does not in any way prejudge the outcome of our review of other funding streams and programs. It is simply the first decision to emerge from the review which is ongoing.”
The official gave no details on exactly how much money was given to the Palestinians.
But according to the Times of Israel the amount appears to be in the region of $42 million. Total US aid spent in the West Bank this year totals $92796646. In mid May that figure stood at $50.5 million.
In January Washington announced it also would withhold the $65 million in assistance to the UN relief agency for Palestinians. The move came after Palestinians protested US President Donald Trump’s decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and move the US embassy there.
