By Nabil Al Mulhem
Albawaba.com – Damascus
Arab foreign ministers, who gathered in Damascus to follow up with the resolutions of the October Arab summit concentrated during their two-day meeting on coming up with mechanisms to financially help the Palestinian people and the Intifada, said well-informed diplomatic sources.
The sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told Albawba.com that Palestinian Minister of International Cooperation, Nabil Shaath presented the Follow-up Committee with a detailed report on the living conditions of the Palestinians and the difficulties they face under the occupation and the daily confrontations with the Israeli forces.
In his report, Shaath called on the Arab ministers to differentiate between the proposed support of development projects in Palestine, which will be handled by the Islamic Bank, and direct assistance that should reach the people “in the field.”
However, the sources said that some Arab delegates objected to sending money directly to the Palestinians. For their part, the Palestinian delegates proposed a number of suggestions to avoid the disagreement, such as putting the money in the hands of the UNRWA, an ad hoc Arab Donation Committee or via any other means deemed acceptable by the Follow-up Committee, provided that the money reaches the Palestinians as soon as possible.
According to the sources, the committee agreed after a prolonged debate to give the money to the Palestinian National Authority.
At the press conference he held after the meeting, the Arab League Secretary General Esmat Abdel Meguid said that the Follow-up Committee was formed following the leaders’ summit. On November 23, Arab finance ministers met and decided the volume of the financial assistance to the set up funds: Al Aqsa and the Intifada. He said the Arabs have collected a sum of $693 million, and entrusted the Islamic Bank to administer the relation between the two funds.
The secretary revealed that Arab businessmen and personalities have also donated money for the Intifada and the donations were deposited at the Arab Bank. Abdel Meguid said that Jordanian banks functioning in the West Bank will cooperate with Palestinian banks to distribute the money among the needy Palestinians.
Meanwhile, the EU has also donated 100 million euros to the Intifada, and this money should reach its beneficiaries as soon as possible, according to the secretary.
The final communiqué of the meeting was announced by Egyptian Foreign Minister Amr Moussa, who said there had been confidential recommendations that would not be made public.
The statement had no mentioning of any talk about Arab boycotting of Israel or freezing normalization of ties with it. Customarily, the communiqué denounced “the Israeli aggression against the Palestinian people and Israeli threats against Syria and Lebanon,” stressing that peace cannot be obtained without the full implementation of the UN resolutions 242 and 338 on the principle of land for peace.
The committee called also for rendering the Middle East a region free of nuclear and massive destruction weapons, and renewed the Arab demand that Israel join the nuclear weapons non-proliferation treaty.
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