On August 2nd, 2004, the Near East Report of AIPAC ran an article by AIPAC staffer Danielle Rogoff, entitled “Dollars and Sense”, in which Rogoff noted that “this year’s foreign aid bill contains key policy provisions”.

Since AIPAC lobbies for the foreign aid bill in its entirety, that means that AIPAC also lobbies for funds that are earmarked to the non-governmental organizations that operate under the aegis of the Palestinian Authority.

According to a spokesperson of AIPAC, that means that AIPAC lobbies for $75 million that is allocated to these NGO’s.

Another aspect of the Foreign Aid bill is the $100 million allocated to UNRWA.

According to Rogoff, this year’s bill will “place stricter auditing procedures that will force Palestinian non-governmental organizations to demonstrate that funds are in no way linked to terrorism before they qualify for US aid”

However, officials of US AID in Jerusalem have found a way to circumvent the legislated requirement of NGO’s to sign a statement that they oppose terrorism or terrorism incitement by not requiring “Contractors and sub-contractors” who receive US AID grants to sign the anti-terror waiver.

What follows is a letter that our agency received from US AID. Please note paragraph 3.

As a result, the agents who receive the money from US AID for educational programs in the Palestinian schools and UNRWA are “contractors and sub-contractors” and not the agencies themselves.

At a time when both the PA schools and UNRWA are firmly based on the idea that the Palestinian Arab people have a right to “liberate all of Palestine”, the US Congress and groups like AIPAC have a right to know how US funds are being used.

As has already been documented in the two books on UNRWA that appear at the home page of www.IsraelBehindTheNews.com, Hamas runs the UNRWA school teachers union, at a time when the UNRWA schools receive grants from the US AID.

Letter received from US AID to our office in response to the question as to whether NGO’s who receive us aid have signed the required document that they will desist from any encouragement of terrorist activity.

January 4, 2003

Dear Ms. Kushner:

In answer to your questions:

#1 Some Palestinian NGOs have signed; some have not.

#2 Per U.S. law, any NGO worldwide that has not signed the certification is not eligible to receive funding.

#3 All grantees and sub-grantees must sign the certification in order to receive funding. Contractors and sub-contractors are not required to sign the certification. (Grants are free money; contracts are for services provided.) Please note that we give grants to Palestinian NGOs, not to “PA” NGOs – the PA (Palestinian Authority) is a governmental body.

I hope this helps.

Thanks,

Monica Pataki
Public Affairs Officer
USAID – West Bank/Gaza
03-511-4816
mpataki@usaid.gov

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