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Arab League says US donations used to finance settlements
The Arab League on Saturday urged US President Barack Obama's administration to prevent American associations from collecting funds to finance Israeli settlement building in annexed east Jerusalem.
Mohammed Sobeih, a deputy secretary general in charge of Palestinian affairs, told reporters such funding was being used for "a hostile and illegal act which stands in the way of reaching a peace deal."
Such associations, exempted from taxation, help to finance the building of Israeli settlements in the Old City and other districts of east Jerusalem, according to a report compiled by the Arab League's office in Washington.
Sobeih said the report showed some of the funds were being used to seize properties from their Palestinian residents and to expel them, singling out the ultra-nationalist "American Friends of Ateret Cohanim."