Itamar Marcus, the founder of Palestinian Media Watch, sat down with Arutz Sheva to discuss recent developments regarding the funding of the Palestinian Authority by the international community.
Great Britain suspended 25 million euro to the PA in October over the salaries that are paid to Palestinian Arab terrorists and their families. There are also pushes in the US Congress and the EU Parliament to halt funding for the PA due to the payments to terrorists and the constant incitement to commit attacks against Jews.
Marcus stressed that Congress, the EU Parliament, and even the Israeli government were unaware of just what the PA uses the aid money it receives for.
"The Palestinian Authority pays all terrorists in Israeli prisons a salary of up to $12,000 a month, which is more than 4 times the average salary in the PA." Marcus said. "Until we discovered that no one, not even the Israeli government knew about it."
"Intelligence officials say that they knew about this in 2003-2004. We only discovered it in 2011. The intelligence community apparently did not think this is of 'great international importance' and did not pass the information to the political echelon."
Marcus said that members of Congress and various European parliaments have expressed increasing interest and concern over the use of their money to fund terrorists who committed attacks and even murder against Israeli citizens- and even foreign citizens such as American citizen Taylor Force.
The US provides the PA with $400 million in funding annually. The EU provides 250 million euros each year to the PA, and various other countries within Europe also provide individual funding to the PA. The PA receives aid from international organizations, such as the UN, as well.