JERUSALEM: Israel will hold up an $89 million cash transfer to the Palestinians planned for this week, the Israeli finance minister said Sunday, in Israel’s first tangible step against a new unity arrangement between Palestinian factions.
Israel wants assurances that any money transferred to the Palestinians will not reach Hamas, which is set to become part of the Palestinian government, said the minister, Yuval Steinitz.
"I think the burden of proof is on the Palestinians, to make it certain, to give us guarantees that money delivered by Israel is not going to the Hamas, is not going to a terrorist organization, is not going to finance terror operations against Israeli citizens," Steinitz said ahead of the Israeli government’s weekly meeting.
Israel collects some tax and customs fees for the Palestinians under the peace agreements of the 1990s. Israel has held up cash transfers several times in the past decade, citing concerns that the money was being used to fund attacks against Israelis.
There was no immediate Palestinian reaction to the Israeli move.
The Palestinian unity deal announced last week aims at a reconciliation between the Palestinian Authority, the Western-backed government in the West Bank that officially seeks an accommodation with Israel, and the Iran-backed Hamas, which rules Gaza and officially remains committed to Israel’s destruction.
The details of the deal, set to be signed at a ceremony in Cairo on Wednesday, remain unclear. It is meant to lead immediately to a transitional government and new elections within one year.
The Israeli government says the deal rules out the renewal of deadlocked peace talks and threatens Israeli-Palestinian security cooperation in the West Bank.
The agreement "should worry not only all Israeli citizens but all those across the world who want to see peace between us and our Palestinian neighbors," Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Sunday.
"Peace will be possible only with those who want to live in peace beside us, and not with those who want to destroy us," he said.
