-Condoleeza Rice, US Secretary of State, 2nd January 2009
"In democratic elections in Palestinian territories backed by the United States in 2006, Hamas won a landslide victory in parliamentary voting.
After the elections, the U.S. government asked the Palestinian Authority to return $50 million in donations for infrastructure improvements. The United States cut off direct, nonhumanitarian aid to Gaza but more than doubled humanitarian aid it funnels through non-governmental groups and the United Nations.
Mahmoud Abbas, president of the Palestinian Authority and a member of Hamas' rival Fatah party, dissolved Gaza's Hamas-led government and declared a state of emergency in 2007. Hamas took control of the territory shortly afterward."
-CNN 'Bush blames Hamas for Gaza conflict' 2nd Jan. 2009
"By spending its resources on rocket launchers instead of roads and schools, Hamas has demonstrated that it has no intention of serving the Palestinian people."
-G.W.Bush, ibid.
"The cost of war (Iraq and Afghanistan) is estimated to be about $170 billion for the 2009 spending alone. Christopher Hellman and Travis Sharp also discuss the US fiscal year 2009 Pentagon spending request and note that “Congress has already approved nearly $700 billion in supplemental funding for operations in Iraq and Afghanistan and an additional $126 billion in FY'08 war funding is still pending before the House and Senate.”
-http://www.globalissues.org/article/75/world-military-spending sited 3rd Jan.2009, Published 1st March 2008 by Anup Shah
"The (Israeli) defense budget for 2008 will be NIS 51.3 billion, thereby setting yet another new record for defense spending. This figure represents over 16% of the entire NIS 314 billion state budget for next year, which the Knesset approved yesterday after passing the accompanying Economic Arrangements Law the day before. It also represents about 7% of gross domestic product..... The base defense budget for 2008 is only NIS 49.35 billion, as recommended by the Brodet Committee on defense spending. However, in the last quarter of 2008, the Defense Ministry will also be able to use $150 million of the U.S. military aid for 2009."- Zvi Zrahiya, Haaretz.com, 28th Dec. 2008. Text in brackets is my own.
*Regards to Propaghandi for their educational lyrics.
