“Kerry unveils $4 billion Palestinian economic plan,” ran the headline in the Jerusalem Post. Well, sort of; the veil still hasn’t been lifted on where the funds will be coming from, or how they will be administered, and who will do the administering. U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry announced the $4 billion “investment” in Palestine at the “Breaking the Impasse in the Middle East” conference of the World Economic Forum (WEF), held in Jordan by the Dead Sea on Sunday, May 26.
“The plan for the Palestinian economy is bigger and bolder and more ambitious than anything proposed since Oslo more than 20 years ago,” Secretary Kerry said, referring to the Oslo Accords, which were hammered out in the Norwegian capital two decades ago. According to the Oslo plan, Gaza and the West Bank would evolve into an independent Palestinian state within five years. However, bitter rivalry between the PLO and Hamas resulted in a PLO regime in charge of the West Bank and Hamas in control of Gaza. Israeli troops occupy the West Bank and patrol the boundary of the Gaza Strip.
Kerry told the hundreds of assembled millionaires and billionaires at the WEF confab that “we are looking to mobilize some $4 billion of investment” for targeted “opportunities in tourism, construction, light manufacturing, building materials, energy, agriculture, and information and communications technology.”
According to Kerry, unidentified “experts” have put together a program that will transform the Palestinian territories. “These experts believe that we can increase the Palestinian GDP by as much as 50 percent over three years,” Kerry declared. “Their most optimistic estimates foresee enough new jobs to cut unemployment by nearly two-thirds — to 8 percent, down from 21 percent today — and to increase the median annual wage along with it, by as much as 40 percent.”
The WEF investment plan has been put together by a team of undisclosed “experts” led by former British Prime Minister Tony Blair. A May 27 story in the U.K.’s Daily Mail carried the headline: “Tony Blair to be in charge of £3 billion plan to revitalise Palestine’s economy, U.S. secretary of state John Kerry reveals.”
Actually, Secretary Kerry didn’t specify that Blair would be in charge of the plan, only that Blair had led the effort thus far. But it may well be that the former prime minister will end up in an administrative role regarding whatever funds materialize. Like many other “public servants,” Blair has parlayed his former government positions into a highly lucrative diplomatic and consultative career. Since leaving office, he has joined JPMorgan Chase as a “senior advisor” (which, reportedly, has paid him millions of dollars) and has launched Tony Blair Associates, which counts among its clients the brutal communist dictatorship of Nursultan Nazarbayev in Kazakhstan. Blair’s firm has also made millions of dollars brokering natural gas, oil, and mobile phone concessions in Gaza and the West Bank. At the same time, Blair has, since 2007, served as Middle East envoy for the United Nations, the United States, the European Union, and Russia.
One of the experts who has surely had a hand in the WEF bailout plan for the PLO and Hamas is Robert Hormats, President Obama’s under secretary of state for economic growth, energy, and the environment. A former vice chairman of infamous Wall Street giant Goldman Sachs, Hormats is also a longtime member (and director) of the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) and Trilateral Commission, the secretive private groups that have dominated the federal government, banking, and corporate America for decades. He has been a senior advisor on the National Security Council to both Republican and Democrat administrations, advising Henry Kissinger, Brent Scowcroft, and Zbigniew Brzezinski. Hormats also serves as alternate U.S. governor for the World Bank, and in April attended meetings of central bankers sponsored by the World Bank and International Monetary Fund regarding the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). It is a near certainty that the IMF and World Bank, along with the EU and the United States will be providing (or guaranteeing) much of the funding that Secretary Kerry vaguely refers to as “private sector” investment for Palestine.
If the past Middle East and Palestinian bailout schemes (see here and here) provide any guide, the rosy predictions of the WEF experts will fall dramatically short. And when the details of the finances finally become known, we undoubtedly will learn that the CFR-Wall Street globalists have once again cashed in on the Mideast turmoil and tragedy, while at the same time expanding the political and economic authority of the United Nations, the IMF, and World Bank.
Photo of John Kerry (center), Shimon Peres (left), and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas: AP Images
Related articles:
World Economic Forum Pushes Global Controls
Davos’ Theme of “Resilient Dynamism” Hides Real Agenda
Economic Forum Pushes Mideast Aid and Free-trade Agreements
A Bad Investment: US Funding, Training PLO Terrorists
Organized Chaos: Behind the Scenes in the Middle East
