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When the International Court of Justice ruled on July 19 that Israel�s
policies and practices in the Occupied Palestinian Territories were
unlawful, �tantamount to the crime of apartheid� according to the
president of the Court, it was a vindication for Palestinians, their
allies, and human rights organizations who have been saying the same
for decades. For 75 years, Israel�s theft of Palestinian land, its
illegal settlement enterprise, and the systemic discrimination against Palestinian citizens of Israel have all contributed to the more
extensive apartheid system. Still, they do not constitute Israel�s
entire plan to ethnically cleanse the land and deny any form of
Palestinian liberation. Too often, the intentional system that
economically fragments and dispossesses Palestinians is overlooked.
This system imposes economic restrictions on Palestinians,
marginalizing them and stripping away their economic agency while
inhibiting their ability to receive aid, participate in the global
economy, and access financial services. It manifests through the
manufactured necessity of aid, legal frameworks that criminalize
direct and mutual aid, and obstructive, discriminatory policies from
private and governmental entities. When placed in this context, there
is one clear way to describe this system of financial exclusion and institutional sabotage � financial apartheid
It is nearly impossible for development and rehabilitation to occur
against the backdrop of sustained, engineered political and economic destabilization; a fact which precedes October 7 but has stood out in
stark relief since. By refusing to provide Palestinians the support
required from occupying powers under international humanitarian law
and actively obstructing any means to support themselves, the Israeli
state has de facto required international actors to fulfill the needs
of Palestinians living under occupation. The current crisis in Gaza is
not the source of this engineered reliance, and any claim that it is
belies Israel�s 17 year Israeli siege and blockade of Gaza (itself a
form of economic warfare against Palestinians) which devastated the
Strip�s economy. Rather, it has exacerbated this manufactured
necessity and underscored how it contributes to the economic
marginalization of Palestinians.
This financial apartheid has forced Palestinians, especially those in
Gaza, to leverage mutual aid networks to obtain the necessities for
survival. For Americans (including those with family members in
Palestine), supporting Palestinians either directly or through these
networks carries significant risk. In a report published this past
February, Palestine Legal and the Center for Constitutional Rights
demonstrated that since the 1960�s, the US Government �has used
anti-terrorism law to target the Palestinian movement and supporters
and to stigmatize Palestinians as terrorists.� This dangerous and
dehumanizing framework used against Palestinians endangers all
non-governmental aid efforts. Among the highest profile examples of
this risk is the case of the Holy Land Five, who were prosecuted under
the �material support� law for donating to Palestinian charities that
the US government itself supported.
On top of the potential legal liability, providing aid directly or
through mutual aid networks also carries the risk of bank account
closures and bans on using money transfer services. Sanctions regimes
targeting terrorist financing have incentivized financial institutions
and service providers to refuse relationships and dealings with
individuals and organizations associated with Palestine. The threat of
severe financial penalties has produced an ecosystem where
Palestinians and their supporters are excluded under the cloak of
prudent risk management.
As a result of their exclusion from traditional banking systems,
Palestinians and those who seek to support them are forced to utilize third-party financial services. Yet even with those servicers,
systematic practices hinder or outright prevent access. For example,
PayPal refuses to provide its services to Palestinians in the occupied Palestinian territories (though it does provide services to
non-Palestinians living on illegal Israeli settlements in the West
Bank), citing high-security risks, a gross misrepresentation
considering Visa, Mastercard, and Apple still provide financial
services on the ground. In another example of online financial
services being used to obstruct access, Venmo (which is owned by
PayPal) closed the accounts of individuals and blocked funds of
individuals who donated to Gaza to provide humanitarian support.
These economic roadblocks are not limited to digital-only platforms.
Cash transfer services, like Western Union and Moneygram, also
participate in the discrimination against Palestinians by blocking
transfers and requesting invasive documentation of both senders and
recipients. Palestinians and those seeking financial support must
provide birth or marriage licenses, property titles, loan and mortgage statements, business registration information, and tax identification.
These unique document requirements are only placed on transfers to Palestinians. Additionally, cash transfers to Palestinians have a
significantly lower limit on how much can be sent, and those transfers
are restricted to be between individuals related by only one degree.
It is important to note that the systems imposing engineered economic instability on Palestinians are not exclusive to those living in Gaza.
Tax revenues belonging to the Palestinian people by way of the
Palestinian Authority (PA) in the occupied West Bank are regularly
withheld by the Israeli government and often used as bargaining chips
to extract concessions from both the PA and the broader Israeli
government. This tax revenue is also subject to frequent deductions by
Israel. Between April and July of this year, the ultra-nationalist
Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich refused to release the tax
revenues, only conceding after the Israeli cabinet approved five
illegal Israeli settlements in the West Bank. During this period, only
50-60% of public sector employees received their pay. The impact of
political gamesmanship played with West Bank tax revenue on the
Palestinian economy is further compounded by, until now, threats by
that same minister to completely cut off Palestinian financial
institutions from the global banking system, a move which UN experts
caution could �paralyze the Palestinian economy�.
Ultimately, the confluence of sustained economic destabilization and
legal frameworks that criminalize direct and mutual aid has created an ecosystem that actively inhibits the growth of a robust Palestinian
economy. Through this financial apartheid, Palestinians are isolated economically and prevented from taking any substantive steps toward
improving their financial situation. The system of economic exclusion
that the Palestinian populations in Gaza and in the West Bank are
subjected to must be dismantled. It is time for the Palestinian
economy to be reimagined and redeveloped.
https://mondoweiss.net/2024/08/end-israels-system-of-economic-apartheid-in-palestine/
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