Honestly, I can't figure this one out. If someone else understands the logic, please explain it to me. The Palestinian government asks for $5.6 billion. The world ponies up $7.4 billion. It is acknowledged by existing donor groups that the invesment might not be a wise one. However, that is the fault of the Jews?
How?
PARIS (AFP) - International donors pledged 7.4 billion dollars to the Palestinians Monday at a conference described by US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice as the "last hope" to save their government from bankruptcy.
Palestinian prime minister Salam Fayyad had formally asked donors meeting in Paris for 5.6 billion dollars by 2010 to help fulfil his plan to develop a viable economy for a future state.
"The real winner is the Palestinian state," French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner told AFP as he announced that a total of 7.4 billion dollars (5.15 billion euros) had been promised.
The pledges were made at a one-day conference convened to agree a package of aid to stabilise the Palestinian economy and shore up the peace process with Israel -- jumpstarted in the US city of Annapolis last month.
"We see this conference as an important vote of confidence on the part of the international community," Fayyad said as the conference wrapped up.
But Islamist group Hamas, which seized control of the Gaza Strip in June and was not invited to Paris or the Annapolis meeting, labelled it a "dangerous conspiracy" aimed at dividing the Palestinians.
"We support all forms of aid, financial or otherwise, to the Palestinian people. But the Paris conference is coating poison with honey and is a dangerous conspiracy," Hamas spokesman Fawzi Barhum said in a statement released in Gaza.
Some humanitarian groups questioned the benefit of such a massive aid package.
In London, the development charity Oxfam warned donors were pouring cash "into a leaking bucket", arguing that aid efforts already in place were being seriously hampered by Israeli restrictions on movement.
"The challenge is to fix the leak, not pour faster... Due to Israel's movement restrictions and the blockade of Gaza, millions of dollars of aid for Palestinians are being lost," Oxfam's Middle East director Adam Leach said.
I'm sorry, but how do roadblocks cause the Palestinians to lose their money? Is everything the Jews fault? I don't get it.
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