I am disgusted that you accept as truth an 'Israeli' occupation.Jerusalem & Judea & Samaria, which Islam conveniently re-labeled as 'West Bank', have always been Jewish land, since the time when G-d gave the land to the Jews. This is taught in the Quran as well. Jerusalem the Jewish HOLY city has always been Jewish, never mentioned in the Quran, and only occupied for some years temporarily by the Turks who removed the ancient Hebrew writing on stone on the Holy of Holies which states that it is Jewish, but stolen by the Muslims and occupied today as the Al Aqsa mosque. Jerusalem & Judea & Samaria thereafter became occupied by Trans-Jordan (now Jordan), allowedd no Christians or Jews into the holy city, & desecrated Jewish holy places & destroyed many ancient synagogues there & gave Jewish homes & land to Muslims. When Israel recovered the lands in a war against Israel made by Jordan, Syria Egypt, etc. they gave much of the land back to the true owners, the Jews. The Jews felt sorry about displacing the Muslim occupants so charged them rent, until Arafat opposed such payments & reluctant arrogant Muslim occupants refused to continue the rightful payments. Now the short memory of the world sees Israel as the occupiers, when the truth is the opposite! The remnants of displaced Muslims after 1948 & 1967 were Jordanians. They relabeled themselves as 'Palestinians' to gain world sympathy, when in fact, that word was created by the ancient Romans to label Israel & the Jews, in an effort to eradicate Israel as a nation and as a land.

What happened to Arafat's wife, devoted to the Jordanians who conveniently changed their names to 'so called 'Palestinians' back in the 1960's, in order to gain world sympathy? All the money Arafat stole and hid away in Swiss banks was donated by those Jew-hating, Muslim sypathizers for the so called 'Palestinian' people. Arfat's wife pays hundreds of thousands of dollars each MONTH to maintain her undeserved life-style. That money should be used to build an infra-structure.....Of course, Hamas wants no real infra-structure, they want training camps in Gaza for terrorists. Israel left green-houses with advanced cooling & watering equioment worth many millions of dollars, when they gave 'land (Gaza) for peace', as Hamas demanded. Hamas destroyed it all and made terrorist training camps and instead of peace, fired 10,000 rockets on Israeli citizens, necessitating the 'Cast Lead' operation. Of course, Hamas played it for sympathy as well, exagerating by the thousands,, the number of non-combatants killed by Israeli soldiers.

Singapore of the MidEast ? why not? yes we can : ) With a highly educated workforce,the Palestinian people are proving that despite the current obstacles, they're ready to build a vibrant economy. For many years of your occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip, you have systematically done everything to block the normal development of the Palestinian economy. Far from allowing the growth and modernization of the economic infrastructure, the occupation authorities have gone to great lengths to thwart any progress in this direction. They have striven to make the Palestinian economy totally dependent on, and subordinate to, that of "Israel". The occupation authorities make and enforce all regulations affecting the Palestinian economy, including ownership of land and natural resources, licensing of all business activities, taxation, and export and import controls. These regulations have the force of law and are seldom successfully challenged in the "Israeli" courts. the Palestinians must now devote their primary effort to the building of a viable economic infrastructure, a prerequisite for Palestinian self-sufficiency, the big Q. is ,would you allow us to do this without putting obstacles in the way?

You missed the point. The only reason you have any economy to speak of - is because what you call "occupation". Without no one to blame - where will the money come from ?

Israel's part in the refusal of Palestinian Arabs to initiate better economic conditions (and I disagree with your premise that it is the fault of the Government of Israel), at least be honest and recognize the gross corruption of Palestinian leaders beginning with Yasser Arafat. You don't seem to wish to recognize this simple fact. Let's hope that Mr. Faayaad is not anything like his predecessors. So far, he does appear to be the real thing.

Gaza should revert back to Egypt and the West Bank to Jordan, just as UN 242 expects.

with the palis is one big con game or lie. Examples, claim to the land, claims of oppression, claims that Jerusalem is a holy muslim city, claims that the money thrown at them is used as "aid" when it goes into corrupt pockets, finances terrorism, and propoganda. claims of IDF brutality that are actually pallywood produced. The only thing they have been successful at is introducing terrorism to the world. ALL of the security procedures worldwide they have been the cause of. They introduced hijacking, suicide bombing, and the like. They have also been successful with the propoganda machine against Jews and Israel and that may be because there are many willing anti-semitic participants. Don't know how they accomplished that since the Jews control the media. The arabs who are successful and moderate are the ones who have escaped their cesspool of a culture.

And you telling me ISRAEL isn't. ISRAEL is the biggest reciever of myine and the US money in the world plus loans that you don't have to pay back plus free weapons and a licence to d owhatever you like. Trust me, the US citizens are taking notice and will change the status que soon.

Same, add up all the foreign aid and military aid Uncle Sam gives out... make sure you group all the Arab countries together including the large U.S. Air Force bases that are located in Arab countries. Are the Saudis paying you for keeping the U.S. Air Force in Saudi Arabia? Is Kuwait paying the bill for American troops stationed there? No, Sam. YOU are. Thousands and thousand of American troops, billions of dollars in hardware (jets, tanks, choppers, dedicate satellites). Tens of billions of dollars every year, buddy boy. And you have the nerve to pretend that we're the biggest receivers? Trust me, you're just another ignorant talkbacker who shows that there are Americans who don't have the faintest clue about facts, but are happy to spend billions of your tax money so that you can suck on the Arab oil tit.

Salma Foreign charities paid the Gaza settlers millions of dollars for their hot houses and donated them to the palestinians. The settlers had got very rich from the sales of the produce that came from those hot houses. The palestinians decided to destroy them. Jews make money, palestinians destroy ways to make money, palestinians blame Israel and go begging for more handouts. You people have alot to thank to so called occuption for. The refugee camps before 1967 were dumps Israel invested millions in making them better places. They might not be luxury apartment blocks but compared to what you got out of Egypt & Jordan its paradise. Why don't you guys get your electricity from Egypt or Jordan? Israel needs to build new power plants but if we stopped supplying power to the palestinians at a redced rate we might not need as many power stations because we would not be providing palestinians. Israelis pay taxes and into health funds for their medical care. You guys get medical care in Israeli hospitals paid for by Israeli taxpayers. If we said to you that we wil end the occuption today but the condition is you no longer asked Israel or anybody else for a single handout and it would be sink or swim would you still be so keen to end the occupation or would you like to keep that safety net occupation as you call it provides?

hand-out state. Now that some S American countries have recognised the Pal beggar state, the present donors can now quit donating to the beggar society so that the recognisers can now support their new beggar state. "All is required is freedom, territory, and sovereignty." If that is all that is required, you'll get all that and more in Jordan, the Pals state. You'll just love your Pals queen Rania who is eagerly waiting on her subjects to cross the border and come home.

nour, out of all muslim arab lands, none is occupied....and look at the dismal economy they have. israeli economy is the best, 100 times better than all these arab lands put together with no oil and nothing. just jewish genius brains. so, tell me again nour....any occupation in jordan, syria, lebanon, iran, egypt, tunisia, lybia, and i can go on and on. yet, no occupation and the economy, corruption, etc... stinks. you do the math.

actually, you are very wrong. for the past many years, the west bank economy (because of israel) has seen a 4-7% economical increase steadily throughout the years, making this palestinian west bank economy the highest most profitable economy in any region. while the world economies have stagnated, the west bank economy grew by nearly 7% annualy. get your facts straight. it is the laziness, the horendous work ethics and the corrupt leadership of the palestinians that makes you who you are today...leeches off others.

sam, learn to spell and read english well before you start educating yourself. what you said is not only a lie, but pure garbage.

I always get a 'high' from bums writing their comments; then , in order to emphasise the righteousness of their " satire " must finish with " Everybody Knows that (I didn't know ). Empty word from an empty head, curtesy of Mr Haider # 7, from Sweeden, where else?. Somehow they have a tendency to miss the fact that Israel has built a country and continues to contribute to the world at large. The newly officialy baptised SCHNORRERS ( beggars for the uninhibited ) keep crying poverty, keep begging, keep insisting that the world owes them, and never fail to bite the hand that feeds them -- Islam at his best. They even surpassed the art of SCHNORRING from their cousins the rabbis, the haredim, the worthless boys in the 'heder'. They represent the best that the US, EU, World banks, UNRWA and other were capable of putting together " THE BIRTH OF A NATION "--- A joke that backfired. PS : I am delighted that SAM's # 38 " I am so happy to learn that the Americans will change the Que Status?". Did Obama tell you this?

Why don't you look at your self? Since all you do 24/7 is to write talkbacks critisizing and bemoaning the mess you are in? Obviously you do not work (or else you would not be writing) just like other Palis. So which fund supports you Salma? You also have electricity and a PC and internet and were it not for benevolent Israel you would neither have the electricity and neither would you dare criticize your corrupt and tyrannical thugs who pose as your leaders. So get off your butt and start working. Take some responsiblity for your miserable existence.

In the long run, the west could pool their resources and create a fund of perhaps $20 billion a year to literally 'do' everything for the Palestinians in perpetuity. This way no sort of self sustaining economy let alone the social institutions to support it need ever be developed. Simply pay ALL Palestinians to stay home in relative middle class comfort. No jobs, no real government. Just provide all of the goods and services to them, for free. Forever. I am not kidding.

very well said...