JERUSALEM (Reuters) – The United States will expand assistance to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to include about 8,500 members of his national security forces and possibly 1,000 Fatah fighters based in Jordan, U.S. documents show.
Providing non-lethal equipment and training to units of Abbas’s National Security Forces, and possibly the Jordan-based Badr Brigade could increase Washington’s role in the power struggle between Abbas’s Fatah faction and the governing Hamas movement.
U.S. assistance has largely been limited until now to around 4,000 members of Abbas’s presidential guard. But documents obtained by Reuters on Saturday showed that the U.S. government’s $86.4 million security assistance program could cover at least 13,500 troops loyal to Abbas.
The National Security Forces (NSF) is the largest security force under Abbas’s control and is viewed by many Palestinians to be the equivalent of an army, though it is poorly trained and equipped compared to the smaller presidential guard.
Under the U.S. security program, $76.4 million will fund “projects to transform and strengthen elements of the Palestinian Authority’s security structure, specifically the National Security Forces and Presidential Guard in an effort to improve public order and fight terror in the West Bank and Gaza,” the documents said.
“These projects have been developed in coordination with the office of the PA president (Abbas), and the overall plan enjoys the support of the government of Israel,” said the documents, marked “sensitive but unclassified.”
I guess we’ll have to go to God for the answer to your question, BZ. I sure don’t have the answer. It’s blowing my mind too! This doesn’t make any sense to me… none whatsoever. If I keep reading this sort of thing it may induce brain damage!
This will not be a popular post with Bush supporters but so be it. I’m not a complete Republican supporter considering their track, though I’d like to be. Those who signed The Pledge likely find themselves in my camp. GOP apologists, when he screws up, they’d likely just move along and I can understand that. But his moves and decisions MUST be made in the light of day, good or bad. I’ll be the first to praise our President Bush and he’s done some excellent things for our country. But some of his other moves leave me completely perplexed, this one amongst them. Hello? Forgotten LAST YEAR already when Hezbollah did nothing but hurl explosive shit from “PALESTINE” into ISRAEL??
BZ
Yep BZ, I feel your pain on this, I supported this man for good or bad too long, I too will heap praise on him for a few things.
However the latest issues with the Border agents, Illegal Amnesty, and the way he is waging this War in Iraq was just the start, Now THIS? My god what is he thinking… He might pass Carter in history as the WORST Pres in History.