That there is such an entity as "the Palestinians" reflects the fact that Palestinians get paid for being Palestinian, paid rather a lot. There was no such entity, no such people, until the money started flowing.
And who pays them? It is remarkably difficult to find out, almost as if paying them was some sort of criminal plot.
But if you dig deep enough, it is primarily the United States and the European Union. And the supposedly European Union aid somehow winds up passing through NGOs full of graduates from the American Ivy League.
The Paris conference (who?) provided 7.7 billion in Palestinian aid over three years 2008-2010. Note that no one seems to want to have their names on these payments.
High estimates for US aid to Israel are based on such highly creative accounting as including Jewish migrants from the US to Israel as foreign aid, and international investment as foreign aid. Actual direct aid for Israel from the US in 2008 was 2.38 billion, which seems remarkably similar to western aid to Palestinians - except that aid to Israel is done with trumpets blowing, and aid to "Palestinians" is done furtively.
Recently the relatively awesome entrepreneur invested 1.25 million USD into this (seasteading institute website here).
It seems such a wonderful concept, finally somewhere where new forms of government could be tried out. But I'm just wondering how in the world they hope to deal with existing governments since their reaction to any kind of serious alternatives, especially one that either economically or ideologically presented a significant challenge, is bound to not be positive.
I was just wondering what LWer thoughts are on this matter? Also has there been any discussion of seasteading in the past that I've missed? Also I'm wondering if anyone would hazard to perhaps offer a prediction or judge how likley this is to succeed (maybe on predictionbook)?