Are you friggin joking. 900mil to rebuild Gaza
 

Wow, all I can say is WOW.

Are you friggin joking. 900mil to rebuild Gaza!

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/firs...econstruction/

Kerry and Hillary led that trip.... Unbelievable given the domestic mess.

Where is Pelozi? She didn't like pledge like a billion?
And why do we have to get involved?

Because we also paid for the weapons that destroyed it.:shocked:

Because we support the Israelis?

I don't get it, never did. We pay to blow them up, we pay to rebuild it.
It sounds like 1967 all over again, ground hog day!!!

Secretery Rice never would have done this. Welcome to the world of kissing terrorist butt. I'm sure they won't be lobbing bombs at Israel now.

imagine if Arafat was still around, that hillary would have a great photo in Gaza with him.

Any Poly Sci majors?
Aid, diplomacy, and force (or the threat of force) - usually a combination of all three - that's how foreign policy is typically executed.
"Diplomacy must be the cornerstone of any foreign policy." That was the first official statement Secretary Clinton made upon confirmation.
Shock and awe are more exciting, but military action alone does not work. That's why the State Department and the Diplomatic Corps are staffed by Ivy League grads and we're here making irrelevant commentary.
I agree that its more fun to distill complex geopolitical issues into a "Kill Em' All, Let God Sort Em' Out" philosophy though - and it fits nicely onto a bumper sticker.

900 million of our money, that once again we don't have, should buy a lot of good will. I'm sure it will work and they will all get along now.

this time we can install surveillance devices in the walls.

Hamas made an overture to the administration last week through a letter given to Senator Kerry on his visit.
Maybe the administration believes that if they supply aid to the Palestinians we'll make better progress than if we supply arms to kill them. Its a crazy irresponsible notion, but that's how these diplomatic types think.

Diplomats should consider the state of this country before getting more involved with the turmoil in the mid-east. There are people out there much smarter than myself, how does one justify sending 900 mill out of this country at this point in time? To build diplomacy in a place with such political unrest doesn't make too much sense to me, at least not right now...

True. This is certainly not the best time to be spending money, but one could also argue that in a general sense, peace efforts should be made before the Horsemen of the Apocalypse appear rather than after.

Peace efforts? Not sure we should even bother. There is a deep rooted hatred for Americans in that region that neither money nor diplomacy will ever cure. It would seem the best course of action would be limited involvement, but close monitoring.

We're not as unpopular in the arab world as we were a few months ago.
But most analysts agree that Obama's popularity is a perishable asset that will fade without action - which explains why the administration is acting now.

Just another example of the new administration haphazardly throwing money at a situation hoping for the best...

Aid to the Palestinians is a bargain, with a multiplier effect of improved American perception in the region. It's important to recognize that the Arab world greatly sympathizes with the Palestinian cause. Indeed, regardless of their country of origin, there is no more unifying issue to Arabs than the future of the Palestinians.
So if the administration is looking to improve our standing among Arab nations, there's no better place to expend aid than in Gaza.

So Joe, what govornment will control the $$$ for the Palestinians? Hammas!

yes they "greatly sympathize" with the Palestinians. Thats why the Pals live in poverty while many of the Arab nations, the highest GDP on the planet, do nothing, not a damn thing to help! :doh:

Totally agree, its the WRONG strategy for the US.

So Arab aid to Palestinians = 0% of all aid?
Jim cites two types of numbers: incorrect or misleading.

without any impact to their taxes or standard of living, Arab nations can pave the streets of Gaza in gold.

and PS, I dont count funding for suicide bombers as "aid"

11% of the pledges came from the US and Canada, 53% from Europe and 20% from the Arab countries

Among oil-producing middle easten states, only Saudi Arabia is in the top twenty in Global GDP. The European Union has the highest GDP in the world - I don't how they are able to that as socialists.

You make some good points sometimes, but your numbers are often tilted or deceptive. But hey, you're in finance. You guys have a tendency to fudge the numbers on occasion.

So 900 mill is less the 11% of the money as a whole?

I don't know what other nations have pledged and the year is not over.

[IMG]file:///H:/home/user/pictures/IMG00012-20090301-1803.jpg[/IMG]U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton on Monday will pledge about $300 million in U.S. humanitarian aid for the war-torn Gaza Strip, plus about $600 million in assistance to the Palestinian Authority, a U.S. official said Sunday.

No rockets?

Reconstruction plan put together by Abbas' prime minister, Salam Fayyad, an internationally respected economist. Hamas, which does not recognize Israel's right to exist, was not invited.Fayyad wants most of the money funneled through his West Bank-based government. He already administers huge sums of foreign aid -- $7.7 billion for 2008-2010 -- and has been sending $120 million to Gaza each month for welfare and salaries of Abbas' former civil servants. Other aid, such as for rebuilding homes, would go directly to the bank accounts of Gazans.