Ramallah- In response to an op-ed written for The Wall Street Journal by Israel’s Deputy Foreign Minister TzipiHotovely accusing Palestinians of utilizing foreign aid to support terrorism, Palestinian Prime Minister Rami Hamdallah said, “Israel’s Deputy FM is using fiction to whitewash Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territories andthe crimes committed by Israeli Colonial Settlers.” The Palestinian government, according to Hamdallah, “operates on the principals of accountability and transparency, especially when it comes to public funds and foreign aid.”

The latest attacks on the Palestinian government by Hotovely and others in the Israeli government represent an act of desperation in order to distract from the real issues on the ground such as, the occupation of Palestinian territories, the illegal settlement movement, the appropriation of Palestinian resources, the suffocating siege on Gaza, the extrajudicial killings of Palestinian minors, and the torture Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails.

“The Deputy FM of Israel should disclose the sources of funding, local & foreign, that her government funnels to illegal settlements where many extremists reside, some of them are terrorists that have Palestinian blood on their hands, instead of using smoke and mirrors to deceive the international community,” Hamdallah added.