Fears that Israeli-Palestinian Security Cooperation Is Faltering
Palestinian officials are warning that the Palestinian Authority could collapse if Israel continues to withhold the $100 million in monthly taxes and customs revenue it collects on behalf of the Palestinian Authority (PA). That would also mean the end of Palestinian security cooperation with Israel –cooperation that Israeli officials say has led to a marked decrease in Palestinian attacks on Israel.
“If we don’t receive tax revenues we would be faced with a crisis that could also greatly impact the security of both Palestinians and Israelis,” Palestinian senior negotiator Saeb Erekat said.
Erekat called on the international community to take measures to force Israel to unfreeze the customs and tax revenues. Israel took the measure in January after the PA applied to join the International Criminal Court (ICC) which could allow the PA to open war crimes trials against Israeli military officials.
According to the economic agreements that exist between Israel and the Palestinian Authority, Israel is to collect these taxes and customs revenues on behalf of the PA, and then transfer them. The deal was signed as part of the Paris Protocol, after the 1993 Israeli-Palestinian Oslo Accords when the two sides seemed headed for a peace agreement.
The Palestinian Finance Minister, Shokri Bshara, told The Media Line that blocking this transfer deprives the PA of more than two-thirds of its monthly budget, excluding foreign aid, and makes it impossible for the PA to pay its 180,000 employees, whose salaries total about $200 million per month.
On the Palestinian street there is growing anger at Israel’s decision to freeze the money transfers, and the lack of any diplomatic movement toward an independent Palestinian state.
“My husband works with the Palestinian security forces and he is so depressed,” Amelie Suleiman, who works at a mobile phone company told The Media Line. “He says the PA should freeze all agreements with Israel, from the Oslo peace accords to all security coordination.”
Palestinian economic officials warn that the PA is on the verge of collapse.
“If the situation continues, there will be no oil in the Palestinian security cars to maintain public order and security,” Mohammed Shtayyeh, the head of the Palestinian Economic Council for Development and Reconstruction (PECDAR), told a news conference in Ramallah. “Israel will pay the price of its collapse because it will reflect on Israeli security.”
The Palestinian security services have stopped dozens of terror attacks on Israelis, say Israeli intelligence officials. They have also been successful at imposing law and order in the West Bank in Area A, which is the part of the West Bank that is under sole Palestinian control.
Disbanding the PA would put pressure on Israel to provide many of the educational and municipal services the PA is currently providing, and that Israel supplied before the Oslo Accords. Israel would struggle today to run the Palestinian school system, and pay the salaries of civil servants.
The calls to end security cooperation and to disband the PA come as the United Nations is struggling to rebuild the Gaza Strip, which was heavily damaged during last summer’s fighting between Hamas and Israel. The United Nations Relief and Works Authority (UNRWA) recently suspended any reconstruction efforts saying that donor pledges have not been paid.
In addition, the PA owes the Israeli Electric Corporation $482 million in unpaid debts, as the PA buys electricity from Israel. The Israeli company has twice briefly cut power to several Palestinian cities as a warning, most recently to Nablus and Jenin on Wednesday afternoon. In the Gaza Strip, there are frequent electricity blackouts but that has not been the case in the West Bank.
The political and economic implications of dissolving the PA could be extensive.
“Dissolving the PA it is not on anybody’s agenda but it could collapse especially in the monetary sector,” Hashem Ashawa, Director of Palestine Bank told The Media Line. “We can`t survive for a long time. The economy here is totally connected with (salaries) which we rely on.”
At the same time, he said he did not believe that the international community would allow the PA to collapse completely.
On the other hand, Nasr Abdul Karim of the Economics Department at Bir Zeit University said that if the PA collapse Israel could reoccupy the areas controlled by PA at the moment, sparking a third intifada, or Palestinian uprising, with violent attacks on Israelis.
Another scenario, he said, is that Israel could create an alternative leadership for PA President Mahmoud Abbas such as local councils which could still help Israel in security matters. A third option would be to turn control of the West Bank and its 2.5 million Palestinians to Jordan, which controlled the area until Israel acquired it in 1967. It is not clear what would happen to the 350,000 Israelis who live in the West Bank under all of these scenarios.