‘We Want Them to Reform Themselves’: EU to Provide Nearly $2 Billion to Aid Palestinian Authority

Latest Developments

EU Prepares Aid Package: The European Union (EU) announced on April 14 that it will provide a $1.8 billion financial aid package to the Palestinian Authority (PA) over the next three years, contingent on internal reforms from the PA. The funding was announced after the first “high-level political dialogue” between EU foreign ministers and PA officials in Luxembourg. “We want them to reform themselves because without reforming, they won’t be strong enough and credible in order to be an interlocutor, not for only for us, but an interlocutor also for Israel,” said EU Mediterranean Commissioner Dubravka Suica.
EU Expects PA to Rule Gaza: The aid package will fund PA projects in the West Bank, eastern Jerusalem, and the Gaza Strip. Approximately $93 million is earmarked for UNRWA, the United Nations dedicated to the descendants of Palestinian refugees, several of whose employees participated in the October 7, 2023, Hamas atrocities in Israel. The European Union is eyeing the PA — which was expelled from Gaza following a bloody civil war with Hamas in 2007 — to take control of the coastal enclave once the Hamas-Israel war ends.
PA Fails to Contain West Bank Terrorism: Israel has consistently rejected suggestions that the PA should take control of a post-war Gaza. The PA has struggled to contain terrorism in the West Bank, causing the IDF to launch its “Iron Wall” operation shortly after PA security forces conducted their own operation in late 2024.

FDD Expert Response

“How can the European Union — or any other donor — reasonably expect meaningful reform from the PA if it doesn’t leverage the aid it provides to demand real accountability? The fundamental issue with the European Union and other donors is that their genuine concern for the challenging economic conditions Palestinians face often impairs objective decision-making. If the PA continues to receive financial assistance from wealthier states without demonstrating substantial and measurable reforms, it has little incentive to alter its entrenched patterns of corruption and inefficiency.” — Joe Truzman, Senior Research Analyst and Editor at FDD’s Long War Journal

“The international community’s calls for reform within the PA have fallen on deaf ears for years. The PA remains deeply corrupt and continues to turn a blind eye to incitement against Israel. Rather than rewarding this behavior, the PA must be pressured to prove its reliability in using funds to improve Palestinian lives. It must end its ‘pay-to-slay’ policy, which effectively rewards terrorists and their families, and it must take a firm stand against the incendiary rhetoric in its educational system that fuels hostility toward Israel.” — Ahmad Sharawi, Research Analyst