Fourth, the economic and financial siege imposed on Palestinians by the Quartet of the UN, US, EU and Russia is eating at their threatened existential survival. One-third of Palestinians in the Israeli-occupied territories are food insecure, according to a "Comprehensive Food Security and Vulnerability Assessment" published in March by the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) and Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO); most affected is the Gaza Strip, where 51 percent of the population suffers from food insecurity. Karen Koning AbuZayd, the commissioner general of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees in the Near East, told an IRIN reporter on March 31 that the humanitarian crisis in the West Bank and Gaza is "worse than ever."
Fifth, The World Bank compared the Palestinian current recession to the Great Depression of 1929. Approximately 10,000 have emigrated from the territories, and approximately 50,000 have applied to do so. Production has been lost due to outright destruction of physical infrastructure and assets by the IOF and the Quartet boycott.
A joint study by the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) late in March said the Israeli military hits on Palestinian infrastructure brought local production to its knees. Dozens of factories migrated to Jordan and scores of businessmen moved abroad to doom the private sector to a situation worse than the public sector. Of course foreign investment is tantamount to nil. This writer personally knows of PLO leaders who are harassed by their landlords because they could not pay their rentals and of PLO ambassadors who have been managing on their own for months. "Today, almost two-thirds of the Palestinian population lives in poverty, with per-capita income at 60% of its level in 1999," Salam Fayyadh said.
Seventh, the economic siege is also eroding public confidence in the financial accountability of the PA; the donors' aid selectively channelled to bypass the PA Ministry of Finance is nowhere transparent to be accounted for: "The money coming in can no longer be traced, and we cannot ensure that it is not being misappropriated," Fayyadh said. This state of affairs is fuelling a chronic PA grievance with rumours about corruption, at a time when older corruption cases are officially still pending judicial prosecution.
This state of affairs will inevitably contribute to further insecurity and will more likely squeeze the Palestinian leadership into an almost impossible mission of securing law and order; citizen's security will continue to be wishful thinking as long as the national security and sovereignty are missing, in as much as democracy is impossibly unattainable if not practiced in a free liberated homeland.
Notes
(1) National Public Radio �NPR, April 3, 2007.
(2) Jerusalem Post, Apr. 5, 2007.
(3) Sunday Telegraph, April 7, 2007.
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