An adviser to Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat slammed the delay in Arab funding for the uprising against Israel, saying only Saudi Arabia has so far delivered on its promises, in an interview published in Dubai Tuesday.
"The Palestinian people who each day sacrifice with their blood have not yet received the promises of Arab financial aid," Nabil Abu Rudeina told the Emirati newspaper Al-Khaleej.
"So far, all we've heard are Arab declarations of good intentions. The only sums we have actually received have come from Saudi Arabia," he said.
"All the promises made so far do not even cover a tenth of the human and material losses on the ground" in the two-month Intifada, Abu Rudeina said.
He called for Arab states, which decided at a Cairo summit on October 21-22 to raise a total of one billion dollars in solidarity funds for the Palestinians, "to deliver real financial support, quickly and without promises."
On November 23, Palestinian finance minister Zohdi al-Nashashibi said Arab countries had so far pledged 653 million dollars to the funds.
Saudi Arabia offered 250 million dollars, Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates 150 million each, Qatar 50 million, Algeria 30 million, Oman and Yemen 10 million each, Jordan two million and Sudan one million dollars, he said.
Nashashibi said the Palestinians "urgently" needed around 245 million dollars to be able to survive the economic crisis created by Israel's blockade of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.
And Palestinian international cooperation minister Nabil Shaath complained last month that only 30 million dollars had reached the Palestinian territories from Arab countries.
That sum for Arafat's Palestinian Authority came from Saudi Arabia, which announced Monday an additional 26 million dollars for families of Palestinians killed by Israeli forces – DUBAI (AFP)
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