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Thursday, February 25, 2010

Khaled Abu Toameh reminds us that the corruption scandal exposed by Fahmi Shabaneh is more than just about sex. For instance:

Following are examples of some of how, according to Shabaneh, international aid to the Palestinians is being "hijacked" by "thieves and thugs in the inner circle of Mahmoud Abbas."

  • Thousands of civil servants whose names appear on the payroll of the Palestinian Authority either do not exist or have never reported for work. The Palestinian Authority has more than 150,000 registered civil servants whose salaries are paid by American, European and Arab governments. Shabaneh's investigations showed that senior officials in the president's office and the Palestinian Ministry of Finance have been "diverting" millions of dollars of these payments to their private bank accounts every month.
  • Just before the January 2006 parliamentary election, the US gave $3.2 million to help Fatah boost its image among Palestinians. The goal was to prevent Hamas from winning the vote back then. [Hamas did win in the end]. Shabaneh says that his investigations showed that the money was given to an advertisement company owned by Abbas's family and that most of the money had "vanished."
  • A former minister in the Palestinian Authority convinced Mahmoud Abbas and his predecessor, Yasser Arafat, to give him about $5 million of international aid so that he could purchase lands in Jerusalem before Jews lay their hands on them. Shabaneh's investigations showed that the minister deposited most of the money in his private bank account and had built a huge and luxurious villa on the outskirts of Jerusalem.
  • Shabaneh's inquires also found that Azzam al-Ahmed, a senior Abbas advisor and Fatah official, took about $1.5 million from Arafat and Abbas under the pretext that he, too, wanted to purchase land that would otherwise end up in the hands of Jews. Ahmed's brother, who served as the PLO's lawyer in Jordan, is also suspected, according to Shabaneh's files, of defrauding the Palestinian Authority into paying him millions of dollars for fictitious land deals.
  • Shabaneh discovered that a former Finance Minister in the Palestinian Authority had deposited $8 million in his private bank account. When Shabaneh demanded explanations, he was told to mind his own business.

The rest. It sort of makes all these ideas for building Arab civil society and economy that much more difficult, doesn't it?

1 Comment

You know, I'm tempted to paraphrase Glenn Reynolds on the subject of global warming:

I'll believe the Palestinians deserve a state when the leaders who CLAIM they deserve a state ACT as though they deserve a state.


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