US-trained Palestinian Security Force under General Dayton November 2009
David Blumenfield
Prepared with a research grant from the Middle East Forum
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
After nearly 20 years, the Palestinian Authority, the PA, has achieved the dubious reputation of being one of the largest recipients of foreign aid per capita in modern times. However, the PA has not achieved stability, democracy, transparency, or accountability. One the most corrupt regimes in the Middle East, the PA remains a fiefdom, at this point in time under the control of chairman Mahmoud Abbas, his sons, and his cronies.
The security forces established by the PA, unsurprisingly, share a similarly dubious reputation. Despite decades of money, training and equipment from western democracies, the PA armed forces-more than 30,000 PA security and intelligence personnel-have in the main behaved little better than militias and are marked by considerable corruption. Rather than improving over the years, however, the forces have becoming increasingly problematic:
- Throughout the course of 2012, a pattern was established in which senior commanders were increasingly allied with organized crime and renegade militias.
In many areas, PA security presence has dwindled as personnel and commanders- trained for the most part by the US-have been recruited by organized crime groups engaged in extortion, as well as in the smuggling of weapons and narcotics. In Jenin alone, this has been the case with scores of PA officers, as evidence mounts of similar phenomena in other cities under PA control, including Bethlehem, Hebron, Nablus, and Tulkarm.
- This situation was exacerbated in the latter part of 2012 by a fiscal crisis.
As monthly salaries were withheld or only partially issued, many PA security personnel, with the consent of their commanders, clocked in and then went off to other jobs, often in the employ of private security agencies or for local criminals impressed by their Western training and equipment.
· The presence of armed Hamas personnel has become a major factor in PA controlled areas in several different respects:
Having benefited from major donations from such nations as Iran and Qatar, Hamas has been in a position to exploit the financial crisis of the PA. Numerous PA security personnel have been quietly engaged to working for the Islamist group, particularly the military wing Izzadin al-Kassam.
Hamas penetration into PA security has been strong in several areas under ostensible PA control, particularly in the Hebron region where senior PA intelligence officers are believed to provide intelligence to Hamas.
The PA security services now allow Hamas to organize huge rallies in areas under PA control. This arrangement, a departure from earlier policy, enables Hamas to openly recruit members as well as to mobilize supporters, as efforts are made to restore the Islamist military infrastructure in areas under PA control. Most of these rallies have ended up as confrontations with the Israel Army.
Senior members of the ruling Fatah movement have touted Hamas’ war with Israel and called on the PA to prepare for another uprising in areas under PA control. Fatah, in statements reported in official PA-run media, has already announced the establishment of units assigned to fight the Israeli Army.
As a function of Abbas’ unilateral push for a state, PA security cooperation with Israel sharply declined in November and December 2012. Palestinian officers facilitated and even aided Hamas-aligned attacks on Israeli civilians and soldiers. In some cases, PA personnel have attacked Israeli soldiers in broad daylight. PA security forces have also tried to stop the Israeli Army from capturing suspected Palestinian insurgents.
The Israeli army has privately acknowledged that Palestinians involved in attacks on Israelis have been allowed to join PA security forces and receive U.S. training.
· Abbas uses the PA security forces for his own purposes.
Abbas has used PA security forces: to retaliate against critics who accuse him of corruption; to destroy or exile his rivals in Fatah; to pursue Palestinians who have sold land to Jews; and to stop Jews from reaching religious sites in the Nablus region.
· None of the above issues has diluted solid Western support for Palestinian Security Forces.
Under President Barack Obama-who seeks to expand PA paramilitary units-the United States has pledged to continue to pour hundreds of millions of dollars a year into Abbas’ coffers, with large sums dedicated to the security forces. This is despite objections from Congress and appeals by Palestinian human rights organizations. Obama has exercised waivers to continue to fund the PA security forces.
@ steven l:
True that
@ yamit82:
Why did they want to interview you? Did you mother bring kugel? My family is over run with aging hippies. Tell your sister in Dalles to “batten down the hatches, something whicked this way comes.” Did you ever watch R. Polansky’s version of Maceth,very good. We were off to Denver for the Fat Stock Show,but Cowboy hates driving in snow.
This report makes the annexation of area C more urgent and critical than ever.
Once Hamas controls the West Bank, the world (the West) will protect these fanatics against IL.
@ Honey Bee:
Nothing like that. My sister just had her first kid and my brother in law was stationed in Rantoul IL.USAF. Drove my mom out to see her, then drove to Madison to visit a friend who managed a TV station at Bowling Green Univ. He interviewed me for one of his programs and while I was visiting him and his wife there was a lot of student violent demonstrations there so I went to see the action. I photographed most of the action with my 200mm telephoto Canon lens and some of the Pix I even sold.
@ yamit82:
You were in Madison,WI during the anti war demontrations. I guessed you are an “old hippie”.
@ Laura:
@ Yidvocate:
@ Shy Guy:
@ the phoenix:
Obama is the ” anti-Moses” leading the Jews back to Egypt and slavery. I gag every time I hear or see a Jew advocating “gun controll” do we never learn!!!!!!!!
American “as a Jew” will dystroy us with their complent,”please like me” houseslave attitude.
@ Yidvocate:
Hard to argue with this, since it is true, unfortunately.
But,
Enough is enough! Time to kick out the intruders and if necessary use lethal force.
Laura Said:
The US has been funding these animals since at least 2007. Obama wasn’t the President at the time.
Plus what Yidvocate said. We are own curse first and foremost. Stupid Jews!
We Jews are an insane lot. We invite our mortal and implacable enemies into our living room, offer them our bedroom and give them weapons to kill us and train them to do so. Is it any wonder that we deserve what we get?
Obama is curse on America and Israel.
@ Shy Guy:
Shy, take a look at the necks of the guys in the front row…
What do you see?
I see a playboy bunny choker… I might be wrong…
🙂
yamit82 Said:
Just another spat in the longstanding feud between the McCoys and the Alperons.
JUST HEARD THERE WAS A TERROR ATTACK TODAY IN TEL AVIV CAR EXPLODED NEXT TO BUS
In fact, the guys on the left and center both look like they’re from Latma – Jamil and Ahwad!
So help me, the tall guy front left with the mustache is Elchanan from Latma. We’re safe!
Comment was spammed????
Looks like they got their uiforms from the same vender supplying the IDF. We used to make our own and many small factorie in Arab and Druze villages made and worked in those factories providing needed employment for women. But money talks and the IDF in order to save Sheles in the military budget outsourced to America even basic items like uniforms and combat boots and shoes, using part of the aid package America supplys to Israel. Never mind that America herself outsourced these items to Haiti and other such places like Mexico.
American aid eliminates tens of thousand of needed jobs here in Israel.