Bloomberg Discovers PA Debtors Prefer Living Wages to Moral Quandaries
Bloomberg's 'Palestinian Authority Sparks Fury by Cutting Prisoner Payments' implies a sudden, arbitrary cruelty. What they conveniently omit? The crushing financial leverage exerted by the US and other nations. For years, the Taylor Force Act (2018) has withheld US aid to the PA over these very payments, effectively forcing their hand while simultaneously blaming them for the consequence. This
isn't PA 'fury-sparking'; it's economic coercion dressed up as internal Palestinian policy, a classic colonial double-bind perfected by those who pay for compliance. So, the PA's choice isn't between 'generosity' and 'cruelty,' but between meeting demands from their international donors, who are also funding their occupation, and providing for families whose members are imprisoned by said
occupiers. One might wonder if Bloomberg would report on a city council's cuts with this level of hand-wringing if the federal government hadn't just defunded them for a specific policy. But then again, some fury is more newsworthy than others.