WASHINGTON – Israel yesterday said that captured documents show that Saudi Arabia had given about $135 million to Palestinian terrorist organizations and the families of homicide bombers in the last 16 months.
Officials at the Israeli Embassy said the families of bombers received an average of more than $33,000 – or about six years’ income for a Palestinian worker – from several Arab states, including Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates.
The Saudi money, funneled by the interior ministry, was aimed at quietly encouraging homicide bombers – including one who killed an American, they said.
An 85-page Israeli report, released yesterday and based on documents seized in the West Bank last month, will be shared with the Bush administration, said Israeli army intelligence Col. Miri Eisin.
One document, of the “Saudi Committee for Support of the Al Aqsa Intifada,” gave details about Hamas terrorist Sufian Al-Jabarin – a Palestinian who killed three Israelis and the American citizen, Joan Dewaney, 47.
On August 21, 1995, Dewaney, a San Francisco native, was on a bus headed for Hebrew University, which she was attending on a scholarship, when Al-Jabarin blew himself up.
Documents identified Al-Jabarin’s bank account number, details about five of his family members and a West Bank used to transfer money to them.
Al-Jabarin’s body was later returned to Palestinian officials and he was given a military burial with a 21-gun salute, Israeli sources said.
Eisin said the documents show “systematic and ongoing” transfers of money from “official Saudi institutions” to the families of homicide bombers and jailed terrorists.
Although the existence of Saudi money transfers was known, Eisin said, “We were surprised by the extent of official Saudi involvement.”
Saudi officials have insisted that any Saudi money sent to West Bank families was humanitarian aid. But Eisin said, “It’s not humanitarian. It’s incitement to terrorism.”
Israeli officials said correspondence captured during last month’s anti-terror sweep of the West Bank also showed Arafat and the Saudis arguing about how to distribute money to terrorists.
A Jan. 8, 2000, letter from the Saudi foreign ministry to the Palestinian rep in Riyadh proposes a meeting “to coordinate the receipt of this money by those who deserve it.”
The PLO chairman complained the money was being sent to Hamas and was not reaching the families of homicide bombers or terrorist prisoners – and should be sent to the Palestinian Authority. But the Saudi interior ministry responded to Arafat by saying they disagreed and would continue to send money to Hamas.
The Israeli report also showed a copy of a Jan. 7, 2001, news summary given to Arafat which described large sums of Saudi money given to Palestinians.
“Please inform me where this money went since the martyrs and wounded received nothing,” he wrote.
Also yesterday:
* Jordanian authorities said they had arrested four Palestinian refugees for trying to smuggle Soviet-made arms, including rocket launchers, to the West Bank and Gaza.
* Three Palestinians, including a Hamas member, died in clashes with Israeli troops in Gaza.
With Post Wire Services