Pompeo hints that the US may give more money to the Palestinians

Congress in December allocated $75 million for humanitarian assistance to the Palestinians that was never transferred to them.

By TOVAH LAZAROFF
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo speaks at the AIPAC policy conference in Washington in March. (photo credit: BRENDAN MCDERMID/REUTERS)
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo speaks at the AIPAC policy conference in Washington in March.
(photo credit: BRENDAN MCDERMID/REUTERS)
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo hinted that the US may consider providing the Palestinians with additional financial assistance, above and beyond the $5 million in humanitarian aid it has already pledged due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
“We hope that this money, this $5m. will get where it needs to go, to provide real assistance to the Palestinian people, who are going to need a lot of help as they move through this,” Pompeo said on Wednesday.
"We will evaluate whether the $5m. both worked and delivered and second if there are more resources that are both either appropriate or can be delivered in a way that actually gets to the Palestinian people,” he said.
The $5m. in humanitarian aid is the first such allocation since the US halted all funding to the Palestinians and the Palestinian Authority at the start of last year.
Congress in December allocated $75m. for humanitarian assistance to the Palestinians that was never transferred to them.
At a press conference in Washington, Pompeo said addressed the US halt in aid to the Palestinians. “Our concern with having provided assistance, was that these resources were not getting to the place they needed to, the Palestinian people,” he said.
In the past, the US had provided some $500m. in annual aid.
US State Department foreign assistance director Jim Richardson spoke of the $5m. allocation, noting that it was designated for Palestinian hospitals in the West Bank and Gaza.
“The US welcomes the ongoing cooperation between Israel and the PA to address the COVID-19 crisis and Israel’s facilitation of goods and equipment to the West Bank and Gaza in support of this effort,” he said.
The World Bank and the UN has warned of the PA's dire economic straits. The PA could be facing a $1.4 billion deficit this year and its economy could contract by 7%.