Will giving Palestinians money fix their economy 1 ?
My answer to this question was collapsed by Zionists and their bots mob reporting a couple of times, they try to silence the Palestinian voice, here it is again:
This is a great question that needs to be thoroughly addressed.
Often Western officials and academics explain the enrollment of the young in militant organizations to social and economical reasons. They believe that since the heads of the family are busy trying to put food on the table, that causes many young to develop psychological and social problems, which explains why many turn to violence and seek revenge from others, or turn to drug dealing and becoming members of criminal gangs that steal and kill. Therefore, they often concluded that improving the economic situation is the key to solving the problems of resorting to violence.
As the Palestinian suffering has continued for decades, it has become increasingly difficult for Western politicians to address Palestinians rights, and often they focus on finding a solution to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict without addressing the core issues (such as right of return, ethnic cleansing, dispossession, ..etc.).
Mother and child arrive in Jordan from the Gaza strip in 1968. (UNWRA).
Sometimes we hear Western officials talk about the suffering of the Palestinian people, and about the bad living conditions in the refugee camps, even sometimes we hear them talk about Palestinian human rights for those who live under Israeli occupation. However, you will rarely hear any of them talk about Palestinian national rights.
Since Palestinians are exhibiting this “violent” phenomena, the West have focused its energy on solving this conflict by improving the economic or living conditions for Palestinians in the occupied territories.
From the beginning, Israel decided to confront Palestinian resistance with an overwhelmingly violent reprisal, however, it did not succeed despite its destructive power. Resistance has increased in quantity and quality to a degree that it is currently scaring many Israelis.
Besides confronting Palestinian resistance, Israel and the Western Governments found it necessary to work also on the economic and financial fronts as well.
Israeli employed multiple restrictions on the Palestinian economy:
- Restrictions on the Movement of People and Goods.
- Theft and Destruction of Natural resources.
- Restrictions on Construction.
- Withholding tax revenue from Palestinians.
Taming The Palestinian People:
The enemies of the Palestinian people resorted to two policies to defeat them:The first aimed to frustrate and depress them by physically defeating their will to resist, and the second policy aimed to entice them with financial gains, and leadership positions within their community.
I am not going to explain these policies in details, the reader can link:
-Defeating the Palestinian resistance in Lebanon 1982.
-The policies that ruined the first Intifada.
-How Israel allowed the flow of money from outside, and how alternate Palestinian leadership was created that does not advocate legitimate armed resistance.
The first phase aimed to find a financial solution to the Palestinian cause by encouraging Palestinian academics to open centers and organizations that believe in the economic solution to the Palestinian cause, and to show the “civilized” face of the Palestinian people.
The first phase aimed to find a financial solution to the Palestinian cause by encouraging Palestinian academics to open centers and organizations that believe in the economic solution to the Palestinian cause, and to show the “civilized” face of the Palestinian people.
In the early 1980s, silently and carefully there was a search for Palestinian academics who could support such a policy. At the beginning, the environment in the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip was not yet suitable for such activities.
Some educated Palestinians surfaced who called for talking to the West in a language that they can understand, which was focused mainly on exposing the suffering of the Palestinian people and exposing Israeli atrocities against them.
In the 1980s, they did not speak against resistance, and they did not disclose their intention to recognize Israel, but they focused on improving the economic conditions as the tool to help the occupied Palestinians, and they focused their attention on establishing a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
At the time, American and Israeli policies aimed to refocus the attention of the Palestinian people away from their Right of Return and from their right to self-determination, to establishing a Palestinian state in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. The Palestinian suffering in the occupied territories was used as the tool:
– To shrink Palestinian demands.
– To shrink the Palestinian people to a people who live in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
In return, these Palestinian academics received many benefits from the Israeli occupation, such as traveling abroad, freedom of movement, lecturing abroad, attending conferences, and even financial support in some cases.
To be specific, I mention the Palestinian Media Center, which enjoyed a wide range of activities including financial support from the PLO without any objections or restrictions from the Israeli occupiers. The people who headed this media center were exposed as Palestinian leaders, and the occupiers even harassed them to enhance their political legitimacy among the Palestinian people.
Slowly since 1988, Palestinians started to accept what used to be forbidden, and they even crossed the red lines which they imposed upon themselves earlier. They:
-Recognized the State of Israel.
-Recognized UN resolutions 242 & 338.
-Collaborated with the Israeli occupation on many security related issues.
-They even arrested many Palestinians for their resistance to the Israeli occupation.
The Policy of buying Palestinian Rights:
After executing the policies of frustrating and financially enticing the Palestinian people, America and Israel turned to restricting Palestinians even more by controlling their sources of income directly or through the Western donor governments.
The goal was, and still is to make the Palestinian people a hostage to the loaf of bread they need to survive; which will turn them away from demanding their national rights and from resisting the Israeli occupation. In other words, the goal is to keep them busy just to survive from day to day, and not even think of their right of return or liberating Jerusalem.
These policies intensified after signing the Oslo Agreement and after the establishment of the Palestinian National Authority (PNA). These policies are rooted on three primary principles:
1- America and Israel linked Palestinian financing to the Western donor countries. It should be noted that this financial assistance was linked to how much Palestinians implemented the signed agreements with Israel, especially regarding the security issues.
America and Israel were determined to exclude Arab countries from financing Palestinians directly (such as financing from Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and UAE), and made sure this financial support comes from the Western donor countries in way that they totally control. It should be noted that some Arab countries provided some financial support, however, this support was provided as a donor country, and not from a sister country who has no security and normalization pre-conditions with Israel.
Therefore, PNA resorted to inflating the number of its employees, where it employed tens of thousands who provided no qualitative services to the Palestinian people.
Tens of thousands received official jobs, especially in PNA’s security services, who had no real job but receiving their monthly salary at the end of the month.
The donor countries did not object to this unwise policy, and continued financing these salaries for years. It was clear that the real purpose behind this assistance was not to serve the Palestinian people, but rather to create a dependency relationship between the Palestinian employee and his salary, which comes from the donor Western countries at the end of the month.
Since the salaries were conditional on PNA’s security cooperation with Israel, salaries were paid so long as resistance to Israeli ceased, and so long as negotiation with it continued.
It should be noted that salaries were not paid to PNA in a lump sum, but rather they were paid on a monthly basis and was conditional on PNA cracking down on groups linked to resisting the Israeli occupation.
The whole world saw how Palestinians allowed themselves to fall into this trap soon after Hamas won the election early 2006, especially when the donor countries cut paying the monthly salaries. Overnight, the Palestinian cause was converted to a cause for paying the salaries of employees who did not work to begin with!
For the salaries to return, Palestinian leaderships found themselves accepting American-Israeli dictation. Consequently, Americans and Israelis effectively control PNA’s public policy.
2- Palestinian Non-Governmental Organization (NGOs) mostly receive their funding from Western donor countries such as Italy, USA, Holland, Norway, France, … etc. with the exception of a few who receive their funding locally or from Arab sources.
Some of these NGOs have normalized the relationship with Israel, and some did not and some even refused to denounce what the Americans calls “terror”. Despite the discrepancies between these NGOs, the employees of these NGOs (who number in the tens of thousands) received their salaries from the Western donor countries, and they have no choice but to think about receiving that salary.
Stability for these people was critical to continuing the social and human projects they are working on, and any resistance to the Israeli occupation may jeopardize their projects.
In other words, these employees worked in an environment that is under the influence of the Western countries that aims to abolish any resistance to the Israeli occupation. It should be noted that some of those NGOs spoke against resisting the Israeli occupation, and their leaders openly normalized relationships with the Zionist entity.
The employees in these NGOs found themselves in a difficult situation trying to balance between their Palestinian national rights and putting food on the table. Just by having the average Palestinian think in such a way, America and Israel have achieved one of their biggest objectives.
3- Paris Economical Conference in 1994 placed the Palestinian economy completely under Israeli control, which as a result made the Palestinian economy completely dependent on the Israeli economy. For example, no goods may enter the occupied territories without passing first through an Israeli businessman. On top of that, Israel has the right to withhold and determine the levied taxes on all goods entering the occupied territories.
At will, Israel controls the Palestinian economy. Similarly, Israel withholds Palestinian taxes. All of this became clear to the whole world when Israel refused to give back the withheld taxes once Palestinians elected Hamas for office, and in many other later instances with the current PA.
Moreover, the Paris Economical Conference connected the Palestinian economy to the world economy especially when it comes to the freedom of movement of goods, and to monitoring all financial transactions.
Consequently, Palestinians imported more at the expense of locally produced goods and services, and as a result Palestinian farmers, carpenters, craftsmen,… etc. became unemployed, and Israelis and Americans controlled the entry of all funds.
In the past, the average Palestinian used to manage his financial situation, however, all that changed after the Paris Economical Conference which controlled the flow of funds, and connected the Palestinian economy with the world’s economic and financial systems.
Conclusion:
Nowadays,, if anybody visits the West Bank, they will hear how the cost of living has sky rocketed, however, they will hear little about the Israeli colonization policies, usurpation of Palestinian lands, arrests, assassinations.
It is not fair to blame the average Palestinian.. Israeli and American policies were accepted by many in the Palestinian elite (especially among the academic class), which forced the average Palestinian to care about feeding his family at the expense of Palestinian national rights.
Priorities for the average Palestinian will switch from national to personal. Instead of holding on to right of return, the average Palestinian will become obsessed with holding on to his salary. If the economical pressure on Palestinians continues, and the daily life in the West Bank continues to be connected with Western financial sources, then priorities for the average Palestinian will switch from national to personal. Instead of holding on to the right of return, the average Palestinian will become obsessed with holding on to his salary.
In a nutshell, the real goal is to buy Palestinian national rights at a fixed price, set according to Israeli and American dictation. Therefore, any talk about any “peaceful solutions” is meant only to gain time until they completely convert the Palestinian cause into a monthly salary cause. Ironically, this is exactly what Za’ev Jabotinsky (Russian Jewish Revisionist Zionist leader) advocated as early as 1923 in his famous Iron Wall article, he said:
“…. Settlement can thus develop under the protection of a force that is not dependent on the local population, behind an IRON WALL which they will be powerless to break down. ….a voluntary agreement is just not possible. As long as the Arabs preserve a gleam of hope that they will succeed in getting rid of us, nothing in the world can cause them to relinquish this hope, precisely because they are not a rubble but a living people. And a living people will be ready to yield on such fateful issues only when they give up all hope of getting rid of the Alien Settlers. Only then will extremist groups with their slogan ‘No, never’ lose their influence, and only then their influence be transferred to more moderate groups. And only then will the moderates offer suggestions for compromise. Then only will they begin bargaining with us on practical matters, such as guarantees against PUSHING THEM OUT, and equality of civil, and national rights.”
Could this policy work at the end? There is no doubt about it that it is relatively working now, however, not all of the Palestinian people earn salaries, and most Palestinian people who do , are not willing and will never give up their national rights in return for the salary.
Related links and references:
1- Money can’t ‘fix’ Palestine’s occupied economy by Yara Hawari.
The Bantustanisation of the West Bank further stunts economic growth by restricting freedom of movement both people and goods. Israel is in complete control of most of Palestinian infrastructure and is able to restrict access to it, as it pleases.
To Palestinians, it is clear that the “economic peace” that is on offer is just another attempt to buy them off. Even the PA and prominent Palestinian businessmen have rejected it.
In post-apartheid South Africa, liberation was not fully achieved because of the separation of politics from economics. While racial capitalism was an important part of the ideological discussions of the African National Congress, it restricted its own anti-apartheid agenda to the political and social spheres. It made significant concessions to the economic elites and embraced neoliberalism, which today is responsible for the gross inequality in South African society and the continuing suffering of the black urban working-class and rural populations.
To avoid repeating the mistakes of the past, it must be recognised that in Palestine, there can never be “economic peace” as long as Palestinians are being denied their rights.
2- The Economic Cost of the Israeli Occupation of the occupied Palestinian Territories(2015) by The Applied Research Institute – Jerusalem (ARIJ).
The report reflects the deep impact of the Israeli occupation and its restrictions on the different aspects of the Palestinian economy. The resulting direct costs and opportunities lost are aggravated given the interrelations between all sectors, and is dependent on the degree of correlation.
Within its scope, the report estimates that the Israeli occupation is costing the Palestinian economy $9,458.8 million annually. The biggest share of these losses are in the infrastructure sector, representing 35% of total costs, 28% due to restrictions on access o natural resources, 17% due to human capital losses, 16% from the different Palestinian industries and services, and 3% as fiscal revenue leakage from the Palestinian Authority to Israel.
The report findings suggest that ending the Israeli occupation is a prerequisite for sustainable economic development in Palestine.
3- Economic Aspects of the Palestinian-Israeli Conflict The Collapse of the Oslo Accord by Fadle M. Naqib(2002).
4- Palestinian Labor Flows To The Israeli Economy: A Finished Story? by Leila Faraskh(2002)
Palestinian labor flows during the Oslo years remained important, but they evolved in a way that reflected a process of redefinition of economic and territorial boundaries between the Israeli and the WBGS economies. On the one hand, the labor links between Israel and the Gaza Strip were sev- ered, and the two economies began separating, with Gaza turning into a de facto labor reserve without access to the Israeli economy. On the other hand, the West Bank was divided into three main de facto “Bantustans” that continued to be tied to the Israeli economy. Palestinian access to the Israeli labor market between 1993 and 2000 was determined by economic forces circumscribed by Israel’s plans to reshape territorial realities in the West Bank to its greatest advantage. The general driving forces behind the absorption of Palestinian labor were set by the growth of the Israeli construction sector and the persisting demand for Pales- tinian workers, particularly in areas along the Green line, in Jerusalem, and in West Bank settlements. The specific labor dynamics were largely the result of Israel’s refusal to demarcate borders clearly with the West Bank while consolidating them in the Gaza Strip. The interplay of labor market realities, security concerns, and territorial considerations led to an outcome that might not have been premeditated, but which was inevitable given the nature of economic and territorial developments that took place.
At present, however, the prospects for the future of Palestinian labor flows are bleak and remain difficult to predict. The eruption of the al-Aqsa intifada in September 2000, and Israel’s military response to it, further fragmented the WBGS. The closures and the draconian measures imposed since then on the Palestinian population suggest that the role of labor in binding the WBGS with the Israeli economies might be over. By December 2001, unemployment rates had surpassed 46 percent in the Gaza Strip and 30.3 percent in the West Bank. Poverty touched 60.4 percent of Palestinian households in the fall of 2001.47 Meanwhile, the Palestinian economy, far from being able to create local means to absorb its labor force, has suffered crippling blows and has been transformed into unviable labor reserves un- connected to Israel.
Still, even during the first half of 2001, construction in the settlements represented 32.6 percent of nationally planned housing projects and 9.5 percent of all private Israeli housing starts. Moreover, between July and September 2001 Israel announced the construction of ten new settlements, and 42,000 Palestinians were reported to be working in Israeli areas. Since that time, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s declared “anti-terrorism” military assault on the West Bank in March and April 2002 destroyed what little remained of the Palestinian economy and brought to a halt all civilian movement, further en- trenching the process of “Bantustanization.” It is not only the future of labor flows that seem irremediably threatened, but the prospects for a viable mo- dus vivendi, to say nothing of a viable peace agreement, between the Israelis and the Palestinians.
5- Israel’s West Bank control ‘costing Palestinian economy billions’ by Harriet Sherwood
Israel’s control of a huge swath of the West Bank is costing the Palestinian economy $3.4bn (£2.1bn) a year, or 35% of its GDP, according to a report from the World Bank.
Restrictions on Palestinian access and movement within Area C, the 61% of the West Bank that is under full Israeli military control, is stunting the Palestinian economy, says the report.
Agriculture would be massively boosted if restrictions on access and water supply were eased, the report says. Most of the farmland in Area C belongs to Palestinians, 326,400 dunams (80620 acres), compared with 187,000 dunams that are attached to Israeli settlements. All Israeli settlements, which are illegal under international law, are situated in Area C.
Access to the Dead Sea would provide opportunities for mineral extraction and tourism.
The Palestinian economy could earn $918m (£571m), 9% of 2011 GDP, if minerals such as potash and bromine were harvested from the Dead Sea.
The Palestinian tourism sector could be boosted by $126m (£78m) annually or 1% of GDP, by creating Dead Sea hotel resorts, similar to those in Israel and Jordan.
Stone mining and quarrying, construction, and telecommunications industries could develop if Israel lifted restrictions, the report said.
“Access to Area C will go a long way to solving Palestinian economic problems,” said Sherman. “The alternative is bleak. Without the ability to utilise the potential of Area C, the economic space will remain fragmented and stunted. Lifting multiple restrictions could transform the economy and substantially improve prospects for sustained growth.”
6- Israel steals more millions from Palestinian money
7- UN slams Israel for ‘de-development’ of Palestine by Zena Tahhan
Key findings:
-Israeli settler population growth rate has surpassed the Palestinian population growth rate; current settler population stands between 600,000 and 750,000.
-10 percent of the Palestinian labour force is employed in Israel and the settlements.
-Unemployment rates are 42 percent in Gaza and 18 percent in the West Bank.
-In 2016, imports from Israel into the occupied Palestinian territories exceeded exports to Israel by $2.6bn.
-Since 1995, GDP in Gaza has shrunk by 23 percent.
-Restrictions by Israel on importation of fertilisers adds $28.6m to agricultural production costs.
-Donor support to the Palestinian economy dropped by 38 percent between 2014 and 2016.
The primary causes for the economic stagnation include “continuing loss of land and natural resources to settlements and the annexation of land in the West Bank”, along with market fragmentation and Israeli-imposed import restrictions, the report notes.
Palestinians in the occupied territories have not had full control over their economy since 1967 when Israel occupied East Jerusalem, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.
Although the Palestinian Authority (PA) was established in 1994 with the hope of creating an independent Palestinian state and economy, expansion of illegal Israeli settlements and the building of the separation wall have made this goal increasingly difficult to achieve.
Israel also has direct control over more than 60 percent of the West Bank, including most of its natural resources.
All of Israel’s illegal settlements in the West Bank, numbering around 125, are located in Area C, where at least 300,000 Palestinians live. Israel prohibits Palestinian construction and development in about 70 percent of this area.
8- UN General assembly : Economic costs of the Israeli occupation for the Palestinian people: fiscal aspects(2019)
Summary of results:
– Estimates of the fiscal costs of the occupation in 2015, based on those that could be mapped in the present analysis, came to $1.7 billion, or 13.1 per cent of GDP for that year. Of that amount, fiscal leakage to the Israeli treasury accounted for $473 million (3.7 per cent of GDP). Other fiscal losses – not leaked to Israel – accounted for the remaining $1.2 billion (9.4 per cent of GDP).
– An extrapolation of the analysis to cover the period 2000–2017 results in an estimated cumulative fiscal leakage of more than $5.6 billion during those 18 years, equivalent to 39 per cent of the 2017 GDP. This amount could have increased the overall Palestinian tax revenues by 17.6 per cent and reduced the current public deficit on a cash basis by 42 per cent. Interest accrued on fiscal revenue captured by the Israeli treasury during the same period adds $1 billion, increasing the estimated cumulative fiscal loss to the Palestinian Authority from leakage alone to $6.6 billion, or an annual loss equivalent to 4.4 per cent of GDP.
–In addition to the leakages to Israel, the cumulative fiscal cost of the occupation for the Palestinian people for the period 2000–2017 is estimated at $19.4 billion, equivalent to 134 percent of the GDP in 2017, i.e., the output of the Palestinian economy over one year and four months. When the compound interest of about $28.2 billion is added, the estimated fiscal costs of the occupation resulting only from the sources surveyed in the present report amounts to $47.7 billion during the period 2000–2017.That equals more than three times of what the Palestinians produced in 2017.
Conclusions:
– The analysis and figures provided in the present report highlight a number of enduring problems that have worsened over the years, namely: the smuggling of goods from Israel and from illegal settlements to the Palestinian market; increased fiscal leakage resulting from indirect imports via Israel; the inability of the Palestinian Authority to enforce the proper invoicing of imports and the transport of imports from Israel or any third country; control by Israel of Area C (more than 60 per cent of the West Bank) and lack of access enabling the Palestinians to operate there. All of these and other measures imposed by the OCCUPYING Power have compounded the challenges facing the Palestinian Government in collecting revenue and have resulted in a loss of large parts of that revenue, which has led to a chronic budget deficit and has further shrunk the fiscal and policy space available to Palestinian policymakers.
– To cover these fiscal costs caused by the occupation and the ensuing financing gaps, the Palestinian Government has increasingly relied on international aid, borrowed from local banks, accumulated arrears with the domestic private sector and rationalized its expenditures. Those measures have slowed down the drivers of economic growth by reducing developmental expenditure to less than 3 per cent of total public expenditure in recent years.These conditions have resulted in an increasingly weak and fragile Palestinian economy characterized by inadequate and deteriorating public services and weak aggregate expenditure, in particular expenditure for investment and development purposes.
– In conclusion, the fiscal losses, the narrow policy space available to Palestinian decision makers and the lack of control over economic affairs have undermined the capacity of the Palestinian Government to adopt effective financial, tax and development policies. The economic policy framework and its implementation should be consistent with Palestinian development needs and priorities, and should facilitate the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals in the Occupied Palestinian Territory and the economic security of the State of Palestine as called for in several resolutions adopted by the Security Council and the General Assembly, such as Council resolutions 1850 (2008) and 1860 (2009), and Assembly resolution 72/13.
–To achieve that, a fundamental change is needed in many working arrangements, including those relating to: border crossing points and access by Palestinian officials to those points, as well as to Area C; import policies and import surveillance mechanisms; and the exchange of information, data and records concerning imports. Furthermore, as was done in 2016, Israel and the Palestinian Authority may consider negotiating some of the topics raised in the present report to address and rectify all outstanding issues, resolve accumulated dues to the Palestinian people and establish a mechanism by means of which the Government of Israel may share with the Palestinians all the information related to Palestinian trade and fiscal resources.
– Given the heavy fiscal costs of the occupation, the Palestinian people are much farther away from reaching the Sustainable Development Goals, if it can reach them at all, than it would be without the occupation.There is a need to secure additional resources for achieving the Sustainable Development Goals in the Occupied Palestinian Territory and to strengthen Palestinian people in those efforts.
–The capacity of UNCTAD to support the Humanitarian and economic support are crucial to creating an environment that favours negotiations to resolve the conflict. However, no amount of humanitarian or economic support will resolve the conflict itself. Humanitarian or economic support can only be complementary to a legitimate political process but will not replace political rights or statehood. The United Nations maintains its long-standing position that lasting and comprehensive peace can only be achieved through a negotiated two State solution. The Secretary General will continue to ensure that the United Nations works towards the establishment of an independent, democratic, contiguous and viable Palestinian State, living side by side in peace with a secure Israel, with Jerusalem as the capital of both States consistent with relevant Security Council resolutions and international law.
9- The economic dimensions of prolonged occupation: Continuity and change in Israeli policy towards the Palestinian economy by Raja Khalidi and Sahar Taghdisi-Rad
The PER should, therefore, no longer define the parameters or limits of the policy framework required for Palestine to be a viable and peaceful State from day one. Rather, a different set of principles should be highlighted in trying to carve out the economic policy space for a Palestinian State, in particular those which can safeguard its sovereignty in a world of global interdependence and market liberalism, such as:
– Restoring the territorial integrity of the West Bank and Gaza Strip, as affirmed in the PER and as undeniably necessary for viable statehood;
– Recognizing the separate status of the Palestinian customs territory, which is implicit in the choice made in 1994 by Palestine to opt for a customs union with the separate customs territory of Israel, regardless of the form of any permanent status economic arrangement between Israel and Palestine;
– Addressing the special needs of a newly independent, war-torn State as it emerges into the community of nations, and equipping it with multilateral means to enhance its economic policy space and development prospects; and
– Beginning today, to form the institutions for a viable State, rather than pursuing the incessant reform of institutions of self-government which were designed and still function according to a set of promises whose fulfilment remains elusive.
The economic dimensions of prolonged occupation Continuity and change in Israeli policy towards the Palestinian Economy.
10- U.N. refugee agency for Palestinians pays salaries, but crisis persists by Nidal al-Mughrabi
11- The Politicization of Public Sector Employment and Salaries in the West Bank and Gaza by Lamees Farraj, Tariq Dana
12- Legal Implications of Salary Cuts by the Palestinian Authority in the Gaza Strip by Dr.Issam Abdeen
13- Ramallah Government Pays Gaza’s Civil Servants—If They Promise Not to Work – 2007 December - WRMEA
14- Troubled Waters: Palestinians Denied Fair access to Water by Amnesty International
Israel is denying Palestinians their right to access to adequate water by using discriminatory and restrictive policies Donatella Rovera, senior researcher on Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territories said:
“Israel allows the Palestinians access to only a fraction of the shared water resources, which lie mostly in the occupied West Bank, while the unlawful Israeli settlements there receive virtually unlimited supplies. In Gaza the Israeli blockade has made an already dire situation worse.”
Israel uses more than 80% of the water from the Mountain Aquifer, the main source of underground water in Israel and the OPT, while restricting Palestinian access to 20%. Israel takes all the water from the Jordan River, the Palestinians get none.
In the Gaza Strip, 90 to 95% of the water from its only water resource, the Coastal Aquifer, is contaminated and unfit for human consumption. Yet, Israel does not allow the transfer of water from the Mountain Aquifer in the West Bank to Gaza. And because of the blockade on the Gaza Strip and the stringent restrictions imposed by Israel on the entry into Gaza of material and equipment necessary for the development and repair of infrastructure have caused further deterioration of the water and sanitation situation in Gaza, which has reached a crisis point.
Israel’s actions and policies have greatly diminished existing water sources and restricted the availability of water for the Palestinian population in the OPT in breach of Israel’s obligations under international human rights and humanitarian law. These actions and policies include diversion of the Jordan River and its tributaries, leading to the denial of access to water from this source for the Palestinians, the imposition of quotas and restrictive allocations of water from the aquifers as well as restrictions on construction of new water installations.
Through these actions and policies, Israel breaches its obligation under the ICESCR to respect the right to water, which requires that state parties refrain from interfering directly or indirectly with the enjoyment of the right to water.
The obligation which Israel has breached includes its obligation to refrain from engaging in any practice or activity that denies or limits equal access to adequate water, arbitrarily interfering with customary or traditional arrangements for water allocation and unlawfully diminishing water.
The military orders imposed and maintained by Israel create substantial barriers to the availability and accessibility of water for the Palestinian population and are applied in a discriminatory manner between Israeli settlers and the Palestinians living in particular areas. They amount, therefore, to a violation of the right to water as they are “policies which are manifestly incompatible with pre-existing domestic or international legal obligations in relation to the right to water”. They also breach the Hague Regulations’ prohibition on the occupying power changing the character and nature of property and natural resources in the occupied property, and the obligation to safeguard and administer these resources in accordance with the rule of usufruct and not to utilize the resources of the occupied territory for the benefit of its own civilian population.
15- The Occupation of Water by amnesty international
16- Water crisis by btselem
17- ‘Economic Peace’ With Israel Won’t Help Palestinians