Israel cuts off critical funds to Palestinian government

Dion Nissenbaum, Knight… Israel cuts off critical funds to Palestinian government

Dion Nissenbaum, Knight Ridder Newspapers

JERUSALEM – One day after the Islamist militant group Hamas took control of the Palestinian parliament, Israel’s acting prime minister dubbed the new government a “terrorist authority” on Sunday and immediately cut off funds needed to keep the Palestinian Authority afloat.

Israel stepped up its efforts to isolate the incoming government now that it is run by Hamas, which introduced suicide bombings to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and refuses to accept Israel’s right to exist.

“Israel views the rise of Hamas as a dangerous milestone that turns the PA into a terrorist authority,” acting Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said before his Cabinet approved the new steps.

The combative steps underscore the calculated risk Israel is taking in response to the Hamas victory: Israel’s efforts to isolate the new Palestinian government could either force Hamas to moderate its views or drive it toward further extremism and deepen the economic despair of the Palestinian people.

Olmert said Israel would sever military and political ties to the Palestinian Authority until Hamas accepts Israel’s right to live alongside a new Palestinian state, disarms its militants, renounces terrorism and accepts existing peace deals.

In the most significant punitive measure, Israel will stop funneling about $50 million in monthly customs and tax revenue that it collects for the Palestinian Authority and passes along to it.

The money is essential to paying the salaries of 138,000 Palestinian government employees, including 58,000 members of the security forces who could be thrown out of work.

Iraqis probe apparent death squad

Dogen Hannah, Knight Ridder Newspapers

BAGHDAD, Iraq – The Iraqi Interior Ministry has launched an investigation into an alleged police death squad.

Iraq’s Sunni Muslim minority has claimed for more than a year that members of Iraq’s Shiite Muslim-dominated security forces intimidate, kidnap and murder Sunnis, but the probe was triggered by Iraqi soldiers’ chance discovery of 22 Iraqi men in police uniforms allegedly preparing to kill a Sunni man.

The Chicago Tribune first reported the detention of the 22 men in Thursday’s editions.

U.S. Army Lt. Col. Michael Negard, a spokesman for the American-led effort to train Iraqi forces, confirmed the Iraqi investigation. It marks the most public and forceful action that the Shiite-led government has taken to pursue the allegations.

Even so, Saleh al-Mutlaq, a prominent Sunni politician, told Knight Ridder on Thursday that he didn’t trust the Interior Ministry to conduct a thorough, independent investigation.

“We lost that trust a long time ago,” he said.

Iraq’s majority Shiites were repressed under Saddam Hussein’s mostly Sunni regime.

Last June, Knight Ridder documented several instances in which Sunni men who’d been detained by uniformed men in police vehicles later were found dead. The Interior Ministry denied any involvement.

Although there’s never been any proof that Interior Ministry forces were involved, suspicions ran high, in part because the interior minister, Bayan Jabr, is a leading member of the Shiite-led Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, which has close ties to the Badr Organization, a prominent Shiite militia group that’s linked to Iran.