Issue 20
Christmas 2000
Anatomy of Economic Violence
by Suzanne Goldberg
Cries falling on deaf ears
1.5 million people in the West Bank and Gaza could go hungry due to Israel’s military and economic blockade. The military blocade of Gaza and the West Bank is at one moment being relaxed for public relations purposes and then tightened again, "for security reasons", thus drastically limiting the supply of fuel and all commodities. On occasions medical supplies are held up at checkpoints for no account, though the need for these is urgent, given the numbers of injured being cared for.
Urgent appeals for help have been issued by the UN’s Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA) and the World Food Programme. "My impression is that donors are not responding," said one official. "In the past, they linked assistance to the peace process. Now there is no peace process, so they tend not to respond."
Israel’s prime minister, Ehud Barak says that these shortages are deliberate. Economic sanctions plus army firepower, is intended to punish all Palestinians for the actions of the handful who fire on troops and Jewish settlements in Gaza and the West Bank.
Statistics of oppression
Since the onset of the present Intifada, Israel’s economic blockade on the West Bank and Gaza has been the little recognised face of a conflict which has claimed over 280 lives, and injured nearly ten thousand people so far. It has devastated the Palestinian economy, reversing all the progress made over the last five years, and bringing three million people - the overall population of the two territories - to the point of ruin.
In Gaza the population is especially vulnerable. A third of the labour force has been turned out of jobs across the border in Israel, and tens of thousands of others have lost local work in the building industry because of a blockade on the export of concrete. By the end of the year, about 892,000 people in Gaza, including 635,000 refugees, will have exhausted their savings and need food aid, UNRWA and the WFP predict.
Some 554,000 Palestinians in the West Bank, of whom some 450,000 are refugees, are in similar trouble. By conservative estimates, that means 1.45m of the 3m people in Gaza and the West Bank will need food aid. To feed them, and to rebuild homes and infrastructure, UNRWA is asking for $39 million for the next three months alone. The WFP wants $4 million to cover next month’s food aid. "They do not have any stocks. It is really hand to mouth. Every day finds the situation more tense in the camps," said Karen Koning AbuZayd, Gaza’s deputy commissioner for UNRWA.
Outside the blue gates of the UNWRA field office in Jabaliya refugee camp, desperate women queue from early morning. The officials inside have exhausted their quotas, and have nothing to give them. "People cannot pay for electricity, water, tuition for their children, school supplies. Some cannot buy meat," said one field officer.
In the abyss of debt
Until Israel closed the borders, sealing Gaza behind an electrified fence, members of the el-Eilah family could count themselves among the more prosperous of Jabaliya’s inhabitants. Rajab Mohammed Eilah would rise with his two sons every morning at 4am, wait for hours at the Erez crossing for soldiers to check his coveted pink permit to enter Israel, and then go to work as a painter just up the coast in Ashqelon. On a good day, he could count on earning 150 shekels (about $40). Now he is owed a fortnight’s wages by his Israeli boss, and is asking round local shops for credit. "I went to five grocers and asked for credit. I just hope that when the closure ends I can go to work and repay them," he said. "But God only knows." His debts for the last month add up to nearly $660.
Destitution and grief
A few blocks away, Latifa Abdullah Muqayied’s home is bare, except for a photo of her son, Lou’ai, 20, which hangs above a rough sketch of Jerusalem’s al-Aqsa mosque. His head was blown off by machine-gun fire from an Israeli helicopter on October 6, robbing the 10-strong family of its one potential bread-winner. Mrs Muqayied has firewood stacked on her asbestos roof for when her cooking gas runs out. In the last few days, gas has disappeared from the shops as the blockade bites. Mrs Muqayied says shops have run out of basics such as sugar, oil and flour.
Economic with the truth
"We have no intention of strangling [the Palestinians]," said Nahman Shai, an Israeli government spokesman. "Just creating pressure in a careful and delicate dosage." For the Palestinians, the approach is sheer folly. In Gaza it is practically impossible to find anyone who will openly say the time has come to resume peace talks with Israel. "This is the harvest of the peace process - de facto apartheid - social and economic suffocation of our people."
© Guardian Newspapers Limited 2000