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Are Palestinian Offensives Inviting Israeli Reprisals?

(Gatestone Institute) Steven J. Rosen - To counter the Palestinians' recent diplomatic offensives, Israel has at its disposal, apart from diplomatic or legal measures, an array of economic responses, should it feel driven to use them. The customs taxes Israel collects on goods shipped to the Palestinian areas, the Value Added Tax [VAT] for goods and services sold in Israel and intended for PA consumption, and petroleum excises comprise more than two-thirds of PA revenues. Israel is not willing to have a one-sided relationship in which it tries to help the PA while the PA crusades against Israel at the UN. While it does not wish to harm the Palestinian economy, on eight occasions since 1994 Israel has suspended transfers of these clearance revenues in response to Palestinian threats. In 2014, U.S. direct aid to the PA was $400 million, and other donors gave another $900 million. But Israeli clearance transfers were $1.8 billion, giving it a greater role than all other outside parties. Moreover, between a fifth and a third of West Bank Palestinian employment is in Israel. Average wages for the more than 109,000 Palestinian workers in Israel are double those in the West Bank. It is not wise for the PA to provoke Israel, which can take measures that will have much more immediate effect than anything the PA can do at the UN. Israel is trying to apply just enough pressure to change the behavior of the PA, but not so much as to bring about its collapse. The rational choice for both parties is to return to the pursuit of common interests through cooperation. The writer, former foreign policy director of AIPAC, is now director of the Washington Project at the Middle East Forum.
2015-01-08 00:00:00
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