In terms of buying power, local income in the Gaza Strip today stands at USD 600 per person per annum. That's less than two dollars per person per day, the poverty line as defined by the World Bank. Two-thirds of Gazans are unemployed. The gates to and from the Strip are closed, the only employers are U.N. agencies, aid agencies and various public sector agencies of the Palestinian Authority. There is no private sector. Even the settler's greenhouses, purchased with private donations from American Jews and donated to the Palestinians, are mostly abandoned. By comparison: In the summer of 1967, when Israel took over Gaza, the average standard of living in Gaza was about 75 percent of that of Jordan. Today, it is less than a quarter of Jordan's. In the twilight of Israeli control, the Gaza Strip became the poorest strip of land in the Western world. Open doors This did not happen overnight. Until the Oslo Accords, Israel's official policy was to control the territories' economy, particularly that of Gaza, to serve the needs of the work market in Israel. Israel opened its doors wide to Palestinian workers, while at the same time forcibly preventing the Palestinians from developing their own economy. In approximately three decades, until 1995, entrepreneurial investment in the territories – not including settlements – was approximately zero. The creator of this policy was Moshe Dayan, over the heated objection of then-Finance Minister Pinchas Sapir. Throughout this period, Israel government spokesmen repeated a standard line: It is very important to us that the "residents of the territories" (they were not yet called "Palestinians") enjoy financial benefit, because economic benefit can beat terror. The concept "benefit" referred not to independent economic development, but rather to deepening the Palestinians' reliance on Israeli employers. Post-Oslo developments After the Oslo Agreement, and especially the "economic protocol" between Israel's finance ministry and the PLO, Israel finally understood the need – and perhaps, for just a moment, the advantage –of developing an independent economy in the Palestinian Authority. But the tools meant to build such an economy were defective from the outset. Instead of relying on foreign investors and business initiatives, the work was left to a large group of wealthy countries, "donor countries." They created a huge bureaucracy that sank 8 billion dollars into the PA, an almost unprecedented amount. Where did the money go? To developing and maintaining the various security forces. To entrenching local bureaucracy, unnecessary infrastructure investments, various white elephants, and public services such as health, education, aid and industry. Recovery and fall It wasn't until 2000 that the PA began to see signs that local business was waking up. They built a casino, traded with Israel and spoke about industrialization. But then came the second intifada and erased it all: the Palestinian economy was silenced by all the closures, roadblocks, and targeted assassinations. Unemployment and poverty dropped to African levels. A billion dollars in foreign aid went for basics such as food distribution, school security, and medicines. Throughout this period, we continued telling the world that we wanted to "improve the quality of life in the territories," in order to thwart terror. These explanations continue today. Lessons unlearned Once again, wealthy counties talk of grandiose plans for the Palestinians, to the tune of billions of dollars. The dreamers are once again floating proposals for "industrial zones" and "infrastructure investment." But in the meanwhile, the only oxygen tube the Palestinian economy has, the Carni Crossing, remains almost entirely closed. Judging by results, it is clear that Israel wants, and has always wanted, Gaza residents not to develop their own economy. Judging from the results, one can only conclude that Israel has an interest in maintaining a poor, desperate and unemployed Gaza. And not only Israel: the Palestinian leadership has not lifted a finger to create a process of economic development. Like Hamas, the Palestinian Authority would like Gaza to remain an "economic prison," because in jail there is no need to take responsibility. In jail, it is always someone else – the occupier, the jailer – that is guilty for the terrible conditions of the jailed. The dire economic situation in Gaza will continue because it serves the interests of many parties, except those of the Gaza residents themselves. But who cares about them?
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