Blocked European Funds to Palestinian Territories to Be Released

(Reuters/Hamodia) – Hundreds of millions of euros in European funds to support the Palestinian Territories can be paid out following the resolution of problems that had blocked their release, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said on Tuesday.

Payment of the funds had been held up by a dispute over proposals by the EU Commissioner for Neighborhood and Enlargement, Oliver Varhelyi, to condition funding on educational reform including the content of Palestinian school textbooks.

“I am glad to announce that the EU funds for 2021 can be disbursed rapidly,” von der Leyen said during a visit to Palestinian Authority headquarters in Ramallah. “All the difficulties are gone. We have made clear the disbursement will take place.” She did not say whether the disbursement would come with conditions.

The European Commission, which contributes some 300 million euros ($312 million), and other European states and institutions that contribute a similar amount, are together the largest donors to the Palestinian Territories, which had faced an increasing financial squeeze.

“Thank you for resuming your assistance to us. This is a day of happiness,” Palestinian Prime Minister Mohammad Shtayyeh told von der Leyen.

Palestinian officials are claiming that the aid will resume unconditionally, but the E.U. has yet to clarify the matter publicly.

“I thank Europe for unconditionally resuming [its] support, and for what it has provided and will provide us with the necessary assistance to preserve Palestinian civil and security institutions,” Shtayyeh said at a press conference with von der Leyen on Tuesday, a statement she allowed to pass without comment.

A spokesperson for the EU’s envoy to the Palestinians declined to comment, saying more information would be forthcoming in the days to come.

IMPACT-se, an Israel- and U.K.-based nonprofit that has lobbied the EU to crack down on anti-Israel material in Palestinian textbooks, insisted that the matter be addressed.

“Clearly the PA textbook issue is too important an issue now to simply go away in the Commission and in the Parliament. The fact is, as of today, no improvements to the textbooks have yet been made,” IMPACT-se director Marcus Sheff said in a statement.

Earlier on Tuesday, von der Leyen met Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett in Yerushalayim, where she welcomed the prospect of increased cooperation in energy supplies and warned of the danger of food problems as a result of the war in Ukraine.

She said the EU had mobilized 25 million euros in immediate assistance to help the Palestinian Territories, which are heavily dependent on imports of cereals from Ukraine.