Reports: Obama administration transferred $221 million to the PA in its final hours
Headline: “In his final decisions, Obama gave the PA $221 million””
“Senior American officials revealed that the administration of previous [US] President Barack Obama secretly transferred to the PA a sum totaling $221 million in its final hours.
The AP [news] agency quoted sources in the American administration as saying that this was aid whose transfer to the Palestinians was prevented by the Republican party (i.e., by Republican members of Congress due to the PA’s unilateral moves to join international organizations, in violation of the 1993 Oslo Accords).
However, the Obama administration transferred the monies while bypassing the opposition of the Republicans, and informed Congress of the plans to transfer the sum last Friday morning [Jan. 20, 2017], a few hours before the beginning of [US President] Donald Trump’s inauguration ceremony. One of the senior officials said that previous American Secretary of State John Kerry informed several members of Congress about this step immediately after he left the American State Department on Thursday evening, but the written announcement on this matter only reached Congress on Friday morning…
The Congress originally agreed to send the aid to the Palestinians as part of the American State Department budget for the fiscal year of 2015/2016, but a number of the Republican members of Congress, including Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee [Ed Royce] and Chairman of the House Appropriations Committee (sic., House Appropriations Committee member Kay Granger ), succeeded in delaying the process of transferring the money, after the PA tried to obtain membership in a number of international organizations.”
PMW note: According to media reports, the transfer of the $221 million has been frozen and is under review by the Trump administration.
“Senior American officials revealed that the administration of previous [US] President Barack Obama secretly transferred to the PA a sum totaling $221 million in its final hours.
The AP [news] agency quoted sources in the American administration as saying that this was aid whose transfer to the Palestinians was prevented by the Republican party (i.e., by Republican members of Congress due to the PA’s unilateral moves to join international organizations, in violation of the 1993 Oslo Accords).
However, the Obama administration transferred the monies while bypassing the opposition of the Republicans, and informed Congress of the plans to transfer the sum last Friday morning [Jan. 20, 2017], a few hours before the beginning of [US President] Donald Trump’s inauguration ceremony. One of the senior officials said that previous American Secretary of State John Kerry informed several members of Congress about this step immediately after he left the American State Department on Thursday evening, but the written announcement on this matter only reached Congress on Friday morning…
The Congress originally agreed to send the aid to the Palestinians as part of the American State Department budget for the fiscal year of 2015/2016, but a number of the Republican members of Congress, including Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee [Ed Royce] and Chairman of the House Appropriations Committee (sic., House Appropriations Committee member Kay Granger ), succeeded in delaying the process of transferring the money, after the PA tried to obtain membership in a number of international organizations.”
PMW note: According to media reports, the transfer of the $221 million has been frozen and is under review by the Trump administration.