Reshaping US aid to the Palestinians

Coyote

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I originally posted this in another thread as a response...but it's intriguing enough to deserve it's own discussion. I adamently oppose the Trump administration's unilateral cutting off of all aid to the Palestinians. Trump has no Middle East plan - all he believes in is punishing people into submission without regard to human suffering. However, this article offers some good ideas on how aid could be structured more effectively.



Reshaping US aid to the Palestinians

With prospects for diplomacy dim, with the need to change reality on the ground to restore a sense of possibility, and with past lessons showing that assistance should be used to promote development and reduce Israeli-Palestinian friction, we propose three recommendations for Congress to reprogram the $200 million fiscal 2018 monies to create a more stable economic, political and security environment in Gaza and the West Bank:

First, use that assistance to take water off the negotiating table. In the not too distant past, water negotiations were zero-sum, given the limited supply of water between the Mediterranean and Jordan River. Now, due to technological gains in water desalination, water use and reuse, water negotiations are no longer binary trade-offs. Instead, they can focus on the much simpler challenges of distribution and pricing.

What could this mean in practice? U.S. assistance in Gaza can fund a small solar field to power the existing Gaza Wastewater Treatment Plant, build up the community-based solar desalination units piloted by MIT, expand the UNICEF solar-fuel facility in Gaza’s Khan Younis neighborhood, initiate additional phases of the World Bank-funded North Gaza Emergency Sanitation Treatment plant, and repair water infrastructure degraded by three wars. Water also is directly linked to electricity; progress in water and sanitation will yield a better, more predictable power supply. There is real potential for small-scale, renewable power throughout Gaza, supplying energy at the community level while minimizing the risk of disruption historically associated with Gaza’s power plant.

Second, U.S. assistance should be used to substantially expand trade between Palestinians and Israelis. Consider the northern West Bank city of Jenin: Israel decided 15 years ago that if it opened a crossing point so Israeli Arabs could shop in the West Bank, it would be a stabilizer, even though the Second Intifada rebellion was ongoing. That calculation was successful; increased Palestinian trade has reduced unemployment in the northern West Bank from reportedly 50 percent in 2003 to below 20 percent now. These robust trading channels have opened sustainable opportunities for small and medium-sized businesses, improved local governance and fostered broad-based security for Palestinians and Israelis alike. In 2003, Jenin was the center for suicide bombers during the peak of the Second Intifada but now is one of the more successful Palestinian cities.

The Jenin model is replicable. American aid can help establish similar trading zones in the West Bank city of Qalqilya where Palestinian traders, shopkeepers and small businesses can sell directly to the large Israeli Arab community a few miles away. The Jenin model also can work in Gaza: Palestinian textile manufacturers have relationships with Israeli designers and European markets; Gaza historically supplied much of the fresh fruits and vegetables in Israel. These relationships could restart in months with the sustained, predictable opening of the Karem Shalom crossing and additional trading corridors from Erez or elsewhere.

Perhaps most interesting is the nascent but growing Gaza tech sector, where Gaza Sky Geeks is incubating Palestinian start-ups and more established firms are initiating software development with tech firms in Israel and beyond. Israel’s tech industry has more than 10,000 unfilled jobs which could be filled from the surplus of high-tech graduates in the West Bank and Gaza.

Third, education is a key foundation for a better future. Israelis and Americans have long criticized the Palestinian Authority for not educating its people for peace. Why not engage American universities and NGOs to elevate the Palestinian education system and prepare Palestinians for a 21st century economy? Bard College has provided long-term teacher training at Al Quds University in which teachers and principals earn an American master’s degree in education and serve as leaders in their schools. Imagine if education programming and people-to-people funding allowed the best cohort of Palestinian youth to study in Israeli universities, intern at Israeli high-tech firms, and do residencies at Israeli hospitals.
 
I originally posted this in another thread in response to your post in another thread...

To be fair, no one has had a realistic plan to this situation for 70 years.

Every year that goes by puts the Palestinians in a worse bargaining position than before.

Being brought to the table, even by force, would be in their best interests.
 
I originally posted this in another thread as a response...but it's intriguing enough to deserve it's own discussion. I adamently oppose the Trump administration's unilateral cutting off of all aid to the Palestinians. Trump has no Middle East plan - all he believes in is punishing people into submission without regard to human suffering. However, this article offers some good ideas on how aid could be structured more effectively.

Maybe You don't understand Trump's strategy, the only time when such new ideas surface regarding actual positive changes in Palestinian society - is only when other options are left unavailable. And it works.
There's another likely strategy in negotiation management - one puts the best offer on the table at the very beginning. Each new stage of negotiations is reacted with a reduction of the offer. It works as well.

Also one has to remember that the people on the other side of the table are wealthy govt leaders who's main personal income has been international aid, but barely show any real investment or interest in the development of the society.


Reshaping US aid to the Palestinians

With prospects for diplomacy dim, with the need to change reality on the ground to restore a sense of possibility, and with past lessons showing that assistance should be used to promote development and reduce Israeli-Palestinian friction, we propose three recommendations for Congress to reprogram the $200 million fiscal 2018 monies to create a more stable economic, political and security environment in Gaza and the West Bank:

First, use that assistance to take water off the negotiating table. In the not too distant past, water negotiations were zero-sum, given the limited supply of water between the Mediterranean and Jordan River. Now, due to technological gains in water desalination, water use and reuse, water negotiations are no longer binary trade-offs. Instead, they can focus on the much simpler challenges of distribution and pricing.

What could this mean in practice? U.S. assistance in Gaza can fund a small solar field to power the existing Gaza Wastewater Treatment Plant, build up the community-based solar desalination units piloted by MIT, expand the UNICEF solar-fuel facility in Gaza’s Khan Younis neighborhood, initiate additional phases of the World Bank-funded North Gaza Emergency Sanitation Treatment plant, and repair water infrastructure degraded by three wars. Water also is directly linked to electricity; progress in water and sanitation will yield a better, more predictable power supply. There is real potential for small-scale, renewable power throughout Gaza, supplying energy at the community level while minimizing the risk of disruption historically associated with Gaza’s power plant.

Second, U.S. assistance should be used to substantially expand trade between Palestinians and Israelis. Consider the northern West Bank city of Jenin: Israel decided 15 years ago that if it opened a crossing point so Israeli Arabs could shop in the West Bank, it would be a stabilizer, even though the Second Intifada rebellion was ongoing. That calculation was successful; increased Palestinian trade has reduced unemployment in the northern West Bank from reportedly 50 percent in 2003 to below 20 percent now. These robust trading channels have opened sustainable opportunities for small and medium-sized businesses, improved local governance and fostered broad-based security for Palestinians and Israelis alike. In 2003, Jenin was the center for suicide bombers during the peak of the Second Intifada but now is one of the more successful Palestinian cities.

The Jenin model is replicable. American aid can help establish similar trading zones in the West Bank city of Qalqilya where Palestinian traders, shopkeepers and small businesses can sell directly to the large Israeli Arab community a few miles away. The Jenin model also can work in Gaza: Palestinian textile manufacturers have relationships with Israeli designers and European markets; Gaza historically supplied much of the fresh fruits and vegetables in Israel. These relationships could restart in months with the sustained, predictable opening of the Karem Shalom crossing and additional trading corridors from Erez or elsewhere.

Perhaps most interesting is the nascent but growing Gaza tech sector, where Gaza Sky Geeks is incubating Palestinian start-ups and more established firms are initiating software development with tech firms in Israel and beyond. Israel’s tech industry has more than 10,000 unfilled jobs which could be filled from the surplus of high-tech graduates in the West Bank and Gaza.

Third, education is a key foundation for a better future. Israelis and Americans have long criticized the Palestinian Authority for not educating its people for peace. Why not engage American universities and NGOs to elevate the Palestinian education system and prepare Palestinians for a 21st century economy? Bard College has provided long-term teacher training at Al Quds University in which teachers and principals earn an American master’s degree in education and serve as leaders in their schools. Imagine if education programming and people-to-people funding allowed the best cohort of Palestinian youth to study in Israeli universities, intern at Israeli high-tech firms, and do residencies at Israeli hospitals.

I see a plan to apply US aid, use of Israeli job-market, economy and campuses.
Q. What are the returns for the investment?
 
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It is good to see that people are beginning to think about what needs to be done in Palestine.

The requirements in Gaza are different than the West Bank. Electricity, water, and sanitation are critical. It should never have been allowed to get this bad. There are some projects in the works but they must be expanded and expedited. There is no time to waste on political bullshit. Get it done.

Almost half of Gaza's farmland is out of production. It will take time and money to get this soil reformed and back in production. I don't see this addressed in the plan.

Gaza's economy will continue t fail without the free movement of people, goods, and money without having to go through Israel. I don't see this addressed in the plan.

One of the biggest problems in the West Bank is that most people love in "population centers" (ghettos, bantustans, whatever) with little or no land available for agriculture, industry, or population growth. I don't see this addressed in the plan.

There is more, but I am trying to keep this short.
 
It is good to see that people are beginning to think about what needs to be done in Palestine.

The requirements in Gaza are different than the West Bank. Electricity, water, and sanitation are critical. It should never have been allowed to get this bad. There are some projects in the works but they must be expanded and expedited. There is no time to waste on political bullshit. Get it done.

Almost half of Gaza's farmland is out of production. It will take time and money to get this soil reformed and back in production. I don't see this addressed in the plan.

Gaza's economy will continue t fail without the free movement of people, goods, and money without having to go through Israel. I don't see this addressed in the plan.

One of the biggest problems in the West Bank is that most people love in "population centers" (ghettos, bantustans, whatever) with little or no land available for agriculture, industry, or population growth. I don't see this addressed in the plan.

There is more, but I am trying to keep this short.

I haven't seen anyone expect foreign aid to be a magic pill.
Which brings me to another question:

Q. What will ensure that PLO uses the aid for the intended civilian projects,
and what are their obligations/time frames upon receiving the aid?
 
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I originally posted this in another thread as a response...but it's intriguing enough to deserve it's own discussion. I adamently oppose the Trump administration's unilateral cutting off of all aid to the Palestinians. Trump has no Middle East plan - all he believes in is punishing people into submission without regard to human suffering. However, this article offers some good ideas on how aid could be structured more effectively.



Reshaping US aid to the Palestinians

With prospects for diplomacy dim, with the need to change reality on the ground to restore a sense of possibility, and with past lessons showing that assistance should be used to promote development and reduce Israeli-Palestinian friction, we propose three recommendations for Congress to reprogram the $200 million fiscal 2018 monies to create a more stable economic, political and security environment in Gaza and the West Bank:

First, use that assistance to take water off the negotiating table. In the not too distant past, water negotiations were zero-sum, given the limited supply of water between the Mediterranean and Jordan River. Now, due to technological gains in water desalination, water use and reuse, water negotiations are no longer binary trade-offs. Instead, they can focus on the much simpler challenges of distribution and pricing.

What could this mean in practice? U.S. assistance in Gaza can fund a small solar field to power the existing Gaza Wastewater Treatment Plant, build up the community-based solar desalination units piloted by MIT, expand the UNICEF solar-fuel facility in Gaza’s Khan Younis neighborhood, initiate additional phases of the World Bank-funded North Gaza Emergency Sanitation Treatment plant, and repair water infrastructure degraded by three wars. Water also is directly linked to electricity; progress in water and sanitation will yield a better, more predictable power supply. There is real potential for small-scale, renewable power throughout Gaza, supplying energy at the community level while minimizing the risk of disruption historically associated with Gaza’s power plant.

Second, U.S. assistance should be used to substantially expand trade between Palestinians and Israelis. Consider the northern West Bank city of Jenin: Israel decided 15 years ago that if it opened a crossing point so Israeli Arabs could shop in the West Bank, it would be a stabilizer, even though the Second Intifada rebellion was ongoing. That calculation was successful; increased Palestinian trade has reduced unemployment in the northern West Bank from reportedly 50 percent in 2003 to below 20 percent now. These robust trading channels have opened sustainable opportunities for small and medium-sized businesses, improved local governance and fostered broad-based security for Palestinians and Israelis alike. In 2003, Jenin was the center for suicide bombers during the peak of the Second Intifada but now is one of the more successful Palestinian cities.

The Jenin model is replicable. American aid can help establish similar trading zones in the West Bank city of Qalqilya where Palestinian traders, shopkeepers and small businesses can sell directly to the large Israeli Arab community a few miles away. The Jenin model also can work in Gaza: Palestinian textile manufacturers have relationships with Israeli designers and European markets; Gaza historically supplied much of the fresh fruits and vegetables in Israel. These relationships could restart in months with the sustained, predictable opening of the Karem Shalom crossing and additional trading corridors from Erez or elsewhere.

Perhaps most interesting is the nascent but growing Gaza tech sector, where Gaza Sky Geeks is incubating Palestinian start-ups and more established firms are initiating software development with tech firms in Israel and beyond. Israel’s tech industry has more than 10,000 unfilled jobs which could be filled from the surplus of high-tech graduates in the West Bank and Gaza.

Third, education is a key foundation for a better future. Israelis and Americans have long criticized the Palestinian Authority for not educating its people for peace. Why not engage American universities and NGOs to elevate the Palestinian education system and prepare Palestinians for a 21st century economy? Bard College has provided long-term teacher training at Al Quds University in which teachers and principals earn an American master’s degree in education and serve as leaders in their schools. Imagine if education programming and people-to-people funding allowed the best cohort of Palestinian youth to study in Israeli universities, intern at Israeli high-tech firms, and do residencies at Israeli hospitals.
Damm Coyote are you a PLO lover ??
 
I originally posted this in another thread as a response...but it's intriguing enough to deserve it's own discussion. I adamantly oppose the Trump administration's unilateral cutting off of all aid to the Palestinians. Trump has no Middle East plan - all he believes in is punishing people into submission without regard to human suffering. However, this article offers some good ideas on how aid could be structured more effectively.

I adamantly support the Trump administration's unilateral cutting off of all aid to the Palestinians.
 
I need to dumb this down. If Mexico was doing to the US what the Palestinians are doing to Israel, there would be no Mexico. Israel is freaking tolerant.
 
I originally posted this in another thread as a response...but it's intriguing enough to deserve it's own discussion. I adamently oppose the Trump administration's unilateral cutting off of all aid to the Palestinians. Trump has no Middle East plan - all he believes in is punishing people into submission without regard to human suffering. However, this article offers some good ideas on how aid could be structured more effectively.



Reshaping US aid to the Palestinians

With prospects for diplomacy dim, with the need to change reality on the ground to restore a sense of possibility, and with past lessons showing that assistance should be used to promote development and reduce Israeli-Palestinian friction, we propose three recommendations for Congress to reprogram the $200 million fiscal 2018 monies to create a more stable economic, political and security environment in Gaza and the West Bank:

First, use that assistance to take water off the negotiating table. In the not too distant past, water negotiations were zero-sum, given the limited supply of water between the Mediterranean and Jordan River. Now, due to technological gains in water desalination, water use and reuse, water negotiations are no longer binary trade-offs. Instead, they can focus on the much simpler challenges of distribution and pricing.

What could this mean in practice? U.S. assistance in Gaza can fund a small solar field to power the existing Gaza Wastewater Treatment Plant, build up the community-based solar desalination units piloted by MIT, expand the UNICEF solar-fuel facility in Gaza’s Khan Younis neighborhood, initiate additional phases of the World Bank-funded North Gaza Emergency Sanitation Treatment plant, and repair water infrastructure degraded by three wars. Water also is directly linked to electricity; progress in water and sanitation will yield a better, more predictable power supply. There is real potential for small-scale, renewable power throughout Gaza, supplying energy at the community level while minimizing the risk of disruption historically associated with Gaza’s power plant.

Second, U.S. assistance should be used to substantially expand trade between Palestinians and Israelis. Consider the northern West Bank city of Jenin: Israel decided 15 years ago that if it opened a crossing point so Israeli Arabs could shop in the West Bank, it would be a stabilizer, even though the Second Intifada rebellion was ongoing. That calculation was successful; increased Palestinian trade has reduced unemployment in the northern West Bank from reportedly 50 percent in 2003 to below 20 percent now. These robust trading channels have opened sustainable opportunities for small and medium-sized businesses, improved local governance and fostered broad-based security for Palestinians and Israelis alike. In 2003, Jenin was the center for suicide bombers during the peak of the Second Intifada but now is one of the more successful Palestinian cities.

The Jenin model is replicable. American aid can help establish similar trading zones in the West Bank city of Qalqilya where Palestinian traders, shopkeepers and small businesses can sell directly to the large Israeli Arab community a few miles away. The Jenin model also can work in Gaza: Palestinian textile manufacturers have relationships with Israeli designers and European markets; Gaza historically supplied much of the fresh fruits and vegetables in Israel. These relationships could restart in months with the sustained, predictable opening of the Karem Shalom crossing and additional trading corridors from Erez or elsewhere.

Perhaps most interesting is the nascent but growing Gaza tech sector, where Gaza Sky Geeks is incubating Palestinian start-ups and more established firms are initiating software development with tech firms in Israel and beyond. Israel’s tech industry has more than 10,000 unfilled jobs which could be filled from the surplus of high-tech graduates in the West Bank and Gaza.

Third, education is a key foundation for a better future. Israelis and Americans have long criticized the Palestinian Authority for not educating its people for peace. Why not engage American universities and NGOs to elevate the Palestinian education system and prepare Palestinians for a 21st century economy? Bard College has provided long-term teacher training at Al Quds University in which teachers and principals earn an American master’s degree in education and serve as leaders in their schools. Imagine if education programming and people-to-people funding allowed the best cohort of Palestinian youth to study in Israeli universities, intern at Israeli high-tech firms, and do residencies at Israeli hospitals.
Why doesn't Iran, who sends literally millions of dollars worth of arms/rockets/munitions to the Palestinians every year divert some of the money for food and medicine?
 
I originally posted this in another thread as a response...but it's intriguing enough to deserve it's own discussion. I adamently oppose the Trump administration's unilateral cutting off of all aid to the Palestinians. Trump has no Middle East plan - all he believes in is punishing people into submission without regard to human suffering. However, this article offers some good ideas on how aid could be structured more effectively.



Reshaping US aid to the Palestinians

With prospects for diplomacy dim, with the need to change reality on the ground to restore a sense of possibility, and with past lessons showing that assistance should be used to promote development and reduce Israeli-Palestinian friction, we propose three recommendations for Congress to reprogram the $200 million fiscal 2018 monies to create a more stable economic, political and security environment in Gaza and the West Bank:

First, use that assistance to take water off the negotiating table. In the not too distant past, water negotiations were zero-sum, given the limited supply of water between the Mediterranean and Jordan River. Now, due to technological gains in water desalination, water use and reuse, water negotiations are no longer binary trade-offs. Instead, they can focus on the much simpler challenges of distribution and pricing.

What could this mean in practice? U.S. assistance in Gaza can fund a small solar field to power the existing Gaza Wastewater Treatment Plant, build up the community-based solar desalination units piloted by MIT, expand the UNICEF solar-fuel facility in Gaza’s Khan Younis neighborhood, initiate additional phases of the World Bank-funded North Gaza Emergency Sanitation Treatment plant, and repair water infrastructure degraded by three wars. Water also is directly linked to electricity; progress in water and sanitation will yield a better, more predictable power supply. There is real potential for small-scale, renewable power throughout Gaza, supplying energy at the community level while minimizing the risk of disruption historically associated with Gaza’s power plant.

Second, U.S. assistance should be used to substantially expand trade between Palestinians and Israelis. Consider the northern West Bank city of Jenin: Israel decided 15 years ago that if it opened a crossing point so Israeli Arabs could shop in the West Bank, it would be a stabilizer, even though the Second Intifada rebellion was ongoing. That calculation was successful; increased Palestinian trade has reduced unemployment in the northern West Bank from reportedly 50 percent in 2003 to below 20 percent now. These robust trading channels have opened sustainable opportunities for small and medium-sized businesses, improved local governance and fostered broad-based security for Palestinians and Israelis alike. In 2003, Jenin was the center for suicide bombers during the peak of the Second Intifada but now is one of the more successful Palestinian cities.

The Jenin model is replicable. American aid can help establish similar trading zones in the West Bank city of Qalqilya where Palestinian traders, shopkeepers and small businesses can sell directly to the large Israeli Arab community a few miles away. The Jenin model also can work in Gaza: Palestinian textile manufacturers have relationships with Israeli designers and European markets; Gaza historically supplied much of the fresh fruits and vegetables in Israel. These relationships could restart in months with the sustained, predictable opening of the Karem Shalom crossing and additional trading corridors from Erez or elsewhere.

Perhaps most interesting is the nascent but growing Gaza tech sector, where Gaza Sky Geeks is incubating Palestinian start-ups and more established firms are initiating software development with tech firms in Israel and beyond. Israel’s tech industry has more than 10,000 unfilled jobs which could be filled from the surplus of high-tech graduates in the West Bank and Gaza.

Third, education is a key foundation for a better future. Israelis and Americans have long criticized the Palestinian Authority for not educating its people for peace. Why not engage American universities and NGOs to elevate the Palestinian education system and prepare Palestinians for a 21st century economy? Bard College has provided long-term teacher training at Al Quds University in which teachers and principals earn an American master’s degree in education and serve as leaders in their schools. Imagine if education programming and people-to-people funding allowed the best cohort of Palestinian youth to study in Israeli universities, intern at Israeli high-tech firms, and do residencies at Israeli hospitals.
Why doesn't Iran, who sends literally millions of dollars worth of arms/rockets/munitions to the Palestinians every year divert some of the money for food and medicine?

You know the answer. They are a terror regime that doesn't value human life. Like Fatah and Hamas.
 
Just recall that it was Israel who helped to create Hamas in order to counter Arafat. We're morally responsible in it as well, given our constant preemprive war crusade to spread 'democracy' all over the globe. How many shadow governments we've installed all over the world, in order to influence what goes on over there, I've lost count. It should be of no surprise that Palestine ended up electing Hamas. It was okay back then, it served its purpose in countering Arafat, but now it's just a big mess.

I think the entire terms of controversy that drive the middle east discussion are wrong. Apples and oranges, for the most part.


My two cents.
 
End all of the foreign aid and kick all of their lobbys out of Washington. We're broke.The nonsense in the middle east is costing us trillions of dollarswe don't have. You wanna know why people don't have healthcare? That's why. And all that the preemptive meddling is accomplishing is a systematic erosion of our liberties here at home, all under the preposterous pretext of security. All we're doing is inviting blowback. Americans are always the losers when that happens. Always. A thinking man might wonder if the hegelian dialectic is at play here.

Bring em home, build more bases here, that's real national defense, and that's real defense spending, quit spending trillions of dollars we don't have under military spending budget and let the jerkoffs kill each other over there. It's none of our business. Done that way, guaranteed that poor Israel would put their arbitrary victim startus card right back in their pocket where they pulled it from and we wouldn't hear much of anything from over there. I've always said that if anyone in the world ever pops off a nuke, it'll be Israel.

The rest of the world is getting tired of that nonsense in the middle east. And our government is largely at fault for it in the modern era.
 
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Those whose mission in life is to kill those of a differing ethnicity shouldn't receive a penny. I am glad Trump did the sensible thing.

I often find myself wondering if we would be seeing so much terrorism today if the world had not been rewarding it for the last five decades. The Arabs who call themselves Palestinians for the purpose of propaganda have proven that mass murder is a lucrative business. It is time for that to stop.
 
"without regard to human suffering"
:rofl:
Palestinians = fucking terrorists... smh


I suppose that if somebody defines Jewish people as something other than human, then they can propagandize for those wishing to kill them by whining about "human suffering"

The suffering of all those who are terrorized obviously does not count for this particular propagandist.
 
End all of the foreign aid and kick all of their lobbys out of Washington. We're broke.The nonsense in the middle east is costing us trillions of dollarswe don't have. You wanna know why people don't have healthcare? That's why. And all that the preemptive meddling is accomplishing is a systematic erosion of our liberties here at home, all under the preposterous pretext of security. All we're doing is inviting blowback. Americans are always the losers when that happens. Always. A thinking man might wonder if the hegelian dialectic is at play here.

Bring em home, build more bases here, that's real national defense, and that's real defense spending, quit spending trillions of dollars we don't have under military spending budget and let the jerkoffs kill each other over there. It's none of our business. Done that way, guaranteed that poor Israel would put their arbitrary victim startus card right back in their pocket where they pulled it from and we wouldn't hear much of anything from over there. I've always said that if anyone in the world ever pops off a nuke, it'll be Israel.

The rest of the world is getting tired of that nonsense in the middle east. And our government is largely at fault for it in the modern era.

Despite all that spend, entitlements comprise 66% of our mandatory spend. Address that before military spend.
 
I originally posted this in another thread as a response...but it's intriguing enough to deserve it's own discussion. I adamently oppose the Trump administration's unilateral cutting off of all aid to the Palestinians. Trump has no Middle East plan - all he believes in is punishing people into submission without regard to human suffering. However, this article offers some good ideas on how aid could be structured more effectively.



Reshaping US aid to the Palestinians

With prospects for diplomacy dim, with the need to change reality on the ground to restore a sense of possibility, and with past lessons showing that assistance should be used to promote development and reduce Israeli-Palestinian friction, we propose three recommendations for Congress to reprogram the $200 million fiscal 2018 monies to create a more stable economic, political and security environment in Gaza and the West Bank:

First, use that assistance to take water off the negotiating table. In the not too distant past, water negotiations were zero-sum, given the limited supply of water between the Mediterranean and Jordan River. Now, due to technological gains in water desalination, water use and reuse, water negotiations are no longer binary trade-offs. Instead, they can focus on the much simpler challenges of distribution and pricing.

What could this mean in practice? U.S. assistance in Gaza can fund a small solar field to power the existing Gaza Wastewater Treatment Plant, build up the community-based solar desalination units piloted by MIT, expand the UNICEF solar-fuel facility in Gaza’s Khan Younis neighborhood, initiate additional phases of the World Bank-funded North Gaza Emergency Sanitation Treatment plant, and repair water infrastructure degraded by three wars. Water also is directly linked to electricity; progress in water and sanitation will yield a better, more predictable power supply. There is real potential for small-scale, renewable power throughout Gaza, supplying energy at the community level while minimizing the risk of disruption historically associated with Gaza’s power plant.

Second, U.S. assistance should be used to substantially expand trade between Palestinians and Israelis. Consider the northern West Bank city of Jenin: Israel decided 15 years ago that if it opened a crossing point so Israeli Arabs could shop in the West Bank, it would be a stabilizer, even though the Second Intifada rebellion was ongoing. That calculation was successful; increased Palestinian trade has reduced unemployment in the northern West Bank from reportedly 50 percent in 2003 to below 20 percent now. These robust trading channels have opened sustainable opportunities for small and medium-sized businesses, improved local governance and fostered broad-based security for Palestinians and Israelis alike. In 2003, Jenin was the center for suicide bombers during the peak of the Second Intifada but now is one of the more successful Palestinian cities.

The Jenin model is replicable. American aid can help establish similar trading zones in the West Bank city of Qalqilya where Palestinian traders, shopkeepers and small businesses can sell directly to the large Israeli Arab community a few miles away. The Jenin model also can work in Gaza: Palestinian textile manufacturers have relationships with Israeli designers and European markets; Gaza historically supplied much of the fresh fruits and vegetables in Israel. These relationships could restart in months with the sustained, predictable opening of the Karem Shalom crossing and additional trading corridors from Erez or elsewhere.

Perhaps most interesting is the nascent but growing Gaza tech sector, where Gaza Sky Geeks is incubating Palestinian start-ups and more established firms are initiating software development with tech firms in Israel and beyond. Israel’s tech industry has more than 10,000 unfilled jobs which could be filled from the surplus of high-tech graduates in the West Bank and Gaza.

Third, education is a key foundation for a better future. Israelis and Americans have long criticized the Palestinian Authority for not educating its people for peace. Why not engage American universities and NGOs to elevate the Palestinian education system and prepare Palestinians for a 21st century economy? Bard College has provided long-term teacher training at Al Quds University in which teachers and principals earn an American master’s degree in education and serve as leaders in their schools. Imagine if education programming and people-to-people funding allowed the best cohort of Palestinian youth to study in Israeli universities, intern at Israeli high-tech firms, and do residencies at Israeli hospitals.

Well, let us consider what our financial aid results in. For Israel it results in endless worldly contributions for better lives, some of which are listed on the thread "Israel: Helping To Make A Better World." And for Palestinians --- you tell us. Fair enough?
 
Well, let us consider what our financial aid results in. For Israel it results in endless worldly contributions for better lives, some of which are listed on the thread "Israel: Helping To Make A Better World." And for Palestinians --- you tell us. Fair enough?


Ok, so Israel has contributed to the world enormously in science, technology, the arts, and humanitarianism.

Aren't you forgetting the Palestinians incredible contributions in regards to the creation and refinement of the suicide vest?

We wouldn't be where we are today without it!
 

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