Israel deepens the financial blockade of the Palestinians by detaining money "Clearing" all

The economic bulletin of the Palestinian News and Information Agency, within the economic file of the Union of Arab News Agencies “Vana”.

Gaza, August 20/ WAM/ for the third month in a row, the Israeli occupation government is holding all the revenues of the Palestinian “clearing” Palestinian taxes, in light of a suffocating financial siege imposed on the Palestinian people, in parallel with the genocide war that it launches in the Gaza Strip, and its continuous aggression on the West Bank, including occupied Jerusalem.
Since the seventh of October 2023, the occupation government has increased illegal deductions from Palestinian tax revenues, but for the first time these returns will be held for three consecutive months without converting them into the Palestinian treasury.
The Paris Economic Protocol signed in 1994 defined the economic relationship between Israel and the Palestinian National Authority, and one of its most prominent items is that Israel has the various customs and taxes of imported goods of the Palestinian territories, as Israel controls the crossings and borders, and therefore it controls all the Palestinian exports and imports that must pass through.
The economic protocol stipulates that 3% of tax funds are deducted in favor of Israel as “administrative commissions” and the delivery of these revenues to the Palestinian National Authority on the basis of monthly eagerness, knowing that it constitutes about 65% of the total public revenues.
Although the nominal value of clearing revenues increased from about $ 1.7 billion in 2013 to $ 3.2 billion in 2023, the occupation government used these returns as a political consumption to impose a financial siege on the government and the Palestinian people, and as a result, the Palestinian government faces a serious financial situation that has exacerbated the decline in comprehensive economic activities, including foreign trade, and the sharp decline in financial support provided by donors to balance the government in recent years.
According to the official data, the occupation government continues to detention about 9.5 billion shekels illegally from Palestinian funds since 2019, including Israeli discounts of border crossings fees “a cumulative amount estimated at about $ 250 million, due”, to increase fees since 2008.
The occupation government annually cuts more than a billion shekels “about 270 million dollars” from the revenue of the clearing on the pretext of covering the electricity and water bills, especially in the Gaza Strip, knowing that there is no strong audit mechanism to verify the validity and accuracy of these services bills, and unlike the signed agreements, other non -specific funds that the occupation government refuse to reveal.
The occupation government also continues to deduct amounts of clearing revenues estimated at about 500 million shekels “about 136.6 million US dollars” per month, parallel to social welfare allocations for detainees and families of the martyrs, Gaza share, electricity and water bills, and others, which doubled the financial burden on the government’s budget.
Since November 2021, the Palestinian government has spent an incomplete wages for its employees, due to the severe financial crisis resulting from the increase in Israeli deductions from the clearing funds, and the decline in the pace of external grants.
According to observers, the continued detention of clearing funds, which constitute more than two -thirds of the state’s revenues, threatens the ability of government institutions to fulfill their financial obligations towards various vital sectors, especially the health sector and its lack of drugs and medical supplies, which threatens the paralysis of the health sector, in addition to undermining the ability of the rest of the institutions “education and social protection and others to perform their duties, along with dangerous indicators such as escalating poverty levels Unemployment and repercussions on civil and societal peace and internal stability.
In an emergency session held last month, the Council of Ministers warned that the continuation of this situation, and the government’s inability to fulfill its obligations towards employees and various sectors, will reflect negatively on the quality of services and the performance of its various tasks, which may push for a decision to temporarily stop the work of some official departments and a sharp reduction in the working hours.
The Palestinian leadership, headed by President Mahmoud Abbas, continues its intensive political and legal moves in various countries of the world, especially the United States of America, as it is signed on the Oslo agreement, as well as France as a host country to the Paris Agreement, to pressure towards obliging Israel to implement the signed obligations.
In addition to its work to restore our detained financial rights, and secure all the resources possible to fulfill the financial obligations, especially the salaries of employees and various sectors, the Palestinian government has taken several measures to alleviate the financial crisis and regulate the permanence of public institutions, in line with the existing challenge and the continued provision of services.
Later on, the Palestinian government has taken administrative and financial measures in order to reduce the burden on public employees, namely: arrangements that the Ministry of Local Government is working to implement with electricity and water companies and local government agencies.

The Ministry of Communications’ procedures are working to implement them with telecommunications companies, and direct the ministers to work quickly on arrangements in order to alleviate the burdens of employees transport to their work centers in a way that does not negatively affect the provision of services to citizens, the continuation of the work of all institutions, and many austerity measures, and continuous reforms in order to reduce and rationalize expenditures, the last of which are regarding medical transfers inside.
The Ministry of Finance, with the support of specialized financial experts, is also working to prepare the requirements for issuing sovereign bonds in order to provide financial issues from investors on the one hand, including banks, investment companies, services and citizens, while this step, if completed, is one of the possible solutions to pay the debts of suppliers and employees.
Parallel to all of this, the Palestinian government is working on other paths, such as improving arrangements for crossings to ensure freedom of movement and travel to citizens in dignity, fight smuggling over the crossings, and fighting tax evasion that heavier over the treasury, and this is expected to achieve an increase in local returns in the coming months.
Muayyad Afaneh notes to “Wafa”, an expert in public finances, that the options are very difficult in light of Israel’s detention of all revenues of the quadruple since last May, and that only the Palestinian government has left local revenues, grants and foreign assistance as resources for the public treasury, pointing out that local revenues have declined due to the contraction of the economy cycle as a whole, and currently reaches the rate of about 250 million shekels per month, while external support is witnessing A significant decline, and in the outcome, the available revenues without the quotas are in no way enough for the basic expenditures and the 70% of the salary, which amounts to 890 million shekels.
He adds that the government’s thinking about government bonds is a good thing, but it needs a long time to reap its fruits, in addition to that it needs a legislative and technical framework for it because the government has never worked on it, and therefore you will not find eating it during the current time.
He explains that the Palestinian government has exhausted technical measures to generate revenues, so net lending was seized through the efforts of the net lending unit in the Ministry of Finance in cooperation with the relevant authorities, and settlements were made with the five electricity distribution companies, and with about 95 local agencies, and the value of these financial settlements reached about 600 million shekels in favor of the public treasury, and they were scheduled to pay, except for limiting the bleeding in the net lending file, as well as the government reached the highest limit From bank borrowing, due to the accumulation of debt and borrowing, especially the collected loan at the end of 2023, and the entitlement of the payment time, in addition to monthly costs related to fuel support, basic operational expenses such as drug suppliers, medical transfers, etc., in practice, public debt and government obligations reached about 13 billion dollars.
Afaneh adds that there are no alternative technical solutions to replace the clearing revenues, and there has become an urgent necessity to launch an international campaign with political, legal and diplomatic paths towards collecting the revenues of the quadruple, and at the same time activating the Arab safety network, to compensate for the public treasury for the detained revenues, in addition to urging the countries of the world to provide emergency support for the Palestinian National Authority or long -term loans, the financial crisis is very deep, It threatens the Palestinian being, and warns of a structural collapse, unless it is corrected.

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