A 'better' West Bank faces roadblocks

International efforts are under way to inject new life into the Palestinian economy in the West Bank, something Israel hopes will contrast life under the Fatah government with life under Hamas rule.

from the August 21, 2007 edition

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Tony Blair's economic promise

Now, however, Tony Blair is hoping he can change all that. Mr. Blair, the former British prime minister recently appointed as a special envoy to the region on behalf of the Quartet (representatives from the US, the United Nations, the European Union, and Russia), is due to arrive by the end of next week, when he will set up shop in Jerusalem and work on promoting peace in large part through Palestinian economic recovery.

Among his goals for his first fall in the region: bringing together Israeli and Palestinian business leaders to invest in joint ventures and new industries in the West Bank. When it trickles down into job creation, the theory goes, the quality of life in the West Bank will vastly improve.

A year on, conditions here would stand in marked contrast, ostensibly, from the quality of life in the Hamas-run Gaza Strip.

While some think this might "force" Hamas to come around, other Palestinians harbor deep misgivings over this approach because it could spell an end to the dream of statehood in the West Bank and Gaza Strip as one territorial unit.

But the PA is already $600 million in debt to the private sector, a finance official here says, and international aid to help it pay up should come first.

Earlier this summer, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, during a visit by US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, offered to remove West Bank checkpoints and ease travel restrictions. But there is little or no palpable change, in part because of Israeli military decisions that any quick loosening of controls would facilitate a new wave of Palestinian attacks on Israelis.

"Israel needs to facilitate the movement of goods and people," says Wadah Hamdullah, deputy director-general of the Palestinian Ministry of Planning. "If they don't do that, and just pour in a few thousand dollars, it won't make a difference."

Btselem, the human rights organization that tracks Israeli policy in the occupied territories, says in a new report that Palestinian travel has been increasingly encumbered since September 2000 and that Israel's network of checkpoints around the West Bank is becoming a systematic, illegal way to separate Israelis and Palestinians and is often unrelated to security. 

In response, the Israeli Justice Ministry defended the travel restrictions and dismissed Btselem's claims. "Regretfully, the terrorist threat, which has cost the lives of more than 1,000 Israeli citizens, makes it imperative, in certain circumstances, to restrict movement in such areas," wrote Attorney Hila Tene in a statement issued Monday.

Israel's produce problem

Amid the other complications of trying to forge an economic recovery when so many big-picture political issues remain unsolved, Israelis and Palestinians are trying to work out an unusual trade agreement that would allow Gazan farmers to provide produce to Israel in the next year.

Starting in late September, Israel enters a shmita, or sabbatical year, a biblically mandated period requiring farmers to let their land lie fallow after six years of working it. Though the issue is the subject of much controversy, most rabbis have concluded that anything grown on Jewish farms in Israel is forbidden and nonkosher, but produce grown in Gaza, or elsewhere in the world, is fine to eat.

An Israeli army official says there are efforts to work out a way to coordinate such a trade plan directly with Palestinian farmers and merchants to avoid having any dealings with Hamas.

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