On December 6^th, the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs released a newsletter highlighting the economic situation in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. Though there are some miscalculations, for the most part the MFA’s data are accurate. The real problem is that the numbers appear without context.

In this week’s post we provide context for the MFA’s (mostly) correct numbers.

Israel’s policy in the Gaza Strip: Permit the entrance of humanitarian aid ONLY – no development, no prosperity, no economic activity.

Food: No luxury, no production

True: “All food products are brought into the Gaza Strip, except for those that definitely constitute luxury items”.

More true: Did you know that honey and canned fruit, which have been banned since the beginning of the closure, definitely constitute luxury items? Or that, for 8 months, tea definitely constituted a luxury item, until it was suddenly permitted into Gaza about two months ago, indicating that maybe it is not a luxury item after all? On the other hand, pasta is definitely not a luxury item anymore, since Secretary of State Hillary Clinton expressed concern about obstacles to the entrance of aid in February. Margarine in small packets is not a luxury item, but margarine in large buckets is definitely a luxury item, because it could then be used as a raw material for local food production, giving Palestinian residents of Gaza the luxury of engaging in productive work.

There are no published lists of what kinds of goods can and cannot enter, and Israel has refused to explain which products constitute a luxury, and which don’t. Without some kind of list – how are we to know?

Unemployment: Revealing all the numbers

True: Unemployment in Gaza dropped from 45.5% in the second quarter of 2008 to 36% in the second quarter of 2009.

More true: According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, the reason for the second quarter drop in unemployment may have been that temporary relief projects, especially for clearing rubble after the military operation, were initiated by international organizations and the local government. The MFA neglects to mention that in the third quarter of 2009 unemployment again rose to 42.3%, as these temporary relief projects ended. Compare this with 32.3% unemployment in June 2007, just before the closure began.

Fuel and electricity: Not meeting needs

True: Israel meets the minimum threshold set by the Israeli High Court for the passage of industrial diesel for electricity production at the Gaza power plant.

More true: The minimum threshold for industrial diesel set by the court is far below what Gaza needs. In fact, the industrial diesel that was transferred in the month of November met just 39.1% percent of needs, creating power outages.

Re-building projects: A drop in the bucket

True: “Israel is conducting discussions with the Palestinian Authority, the US, EU representatives in the area and others, with the aim of establishing an agreed-upon supervisory mechanism, subject to international standards, which will ensure, if and when a decision is made to that effect, that monies, materials and equipment that are brought into the Gaza Strip for vita humanitarian projects actually reach their destinations”.

More true: Israel has refused to allow reconstruction materials to enter Gaza, despite “discussions” that have taken place over the past 11 months. Gaza needs at least 25,000 tons of iron and 40,000 tons of cement for reconstruction. Since the war, Israel has blocked all but 19 trucks of construction materials permitted to enter on an exceptional basis for the humanitarian infrastructure (i.e. water and sewage systems), though restrictions on other materials mean that infrastructure continues to function below capacity (see below). Without reconstruction materials it is impossible to rebuild the more than 3,500 homes destroyed and the approximately 56,000 homes damaged, in addition to over a thousand businesses, factories, and other commercial establishments destroyed and partially damaged during the war. Even if construction materials were permitted in to fix the estimated $45 million in damage to private sector establishments, the ban on import and export ensures that these businesses would likely lay idle, as 97% of factories generally have done so for over two and half years. Some cement enters via the tunnels beneath the Gaza-Egypt border, but prices are beyond the reach of most residents, and many international organizations are restricted from using these materials.

Water, Sewage and Electricity Infrastructure

True: “Israel is conducting a dialogue with Robert Serry, special emissary of the UN Secretary-General, regarding vital humanitarian projects, primarily relating to sewer systems”.

More True: Dialogue notwithstanding, Israeli restrictions on supply of spare parts and materials for the devastated water and electricity systems mean that 10,000 people are without running water, 40,000 people are cut off from electricity, and power outages lasting 8 hours, four times per week are a common occurrence in most homes.

Education: Children paying the price

True: UNRWA schools recently received shipments of education materials, including notebooks and pencils.

More true: UNRWA is the only agency permitted to receive school supplies in Gaza, and only after Israel delayed the entrance of these items for several months. Israel continues to ban the entrance of supplies for two-thirds of the schools in Gaza, the private and government-run schools which educate 240,199 children.

The final section of the MFA newsletter includes a quote by EU Special Representative to the Middle East, Marc Otte. Find here another important statement made by Marc Otte recently in an interview for Al Quds newspaper, describing the EU position on the closure:

“[The] Gaza closure and denying entry to construction materials is morally unacceptable and is a failure. I was in Gaza last week, there were large quantities of cement in Gaza, but the only people who do not get it are the ones who most need it. For this, ban on constructions materials is not acceptable and I have explained this to the Israelis and told them that this is also not in their interest. Our position is clear, especially that winter is coming, and people can not live in tents in the cold and under the rain”.

Post-script: a perceptive reader pointed out to us that in a November 24^thbriefing to the Security Council, Assistant Secretary-General for Political Affairs Mr. Haile Menkerios, made comments in reference to the stalled Serry Plan mentioned in the MFA newsletter:

“Beyond immediate humanitarian needs and the water and sanitation sector, I regret to inform the Security Council that the United Nations has not yet received a satisfactory response from the Israeli government to the proposal, put forward in May, to complete $77 million of stalled UNRWA and UNDP projects in the area of housing units and school and health facilities. The UN has left no stone unturned in seeking approval of this package in extensive consultations with the Israeli authorities, and is confident of its capacity to ensure the integrity of programming. It is completely unacceptable that no meaningful progress has been made in kick-starting UN civilian construction activities essential for the well-being and recovery of a war- and blockade-affected population, half of whom are children”.

This week the Israeli Foreign Ministry boasted that Israel has allowed “a large quantity of educational tools such as notebooks, backpacks, writing tools, and textbooks” into the Gaza Strip in the last month. The Foreign Ministry wrote that: “Through COGAT and the Gaza DCL, Israel makes great efforts to provide for the humanitarian needs of the Gaza Strip, and for this reason the recent transfer was facilitated at the request of the organization [UNRWA].”

“Great efforts” indicate the existence of great obstacles, and the obstacles are indeed great. But ironically, these are obstacles that Israel itself created when it decided that only goods required for maintaining the “humanitarian minimum” would be allowed into the Gaza Strip. And so the recent transfer of educational materials was “facilitated” by Israel’s deviation from its own sweeping policy – of obstruction.

Furthermore, in addition to the fact that the school year began in the Gaza Strip more than 2.5 months ago, the basic goods that Israel has now allowed in are destined only for schools operated by UNRWA, which comprise just one-third of all schools in the Strip – 221 out of 640 schools.

For 240,199 other school students – more than half the student population – who study at government and private schools, the Israeli ban on the import of paper and other basic educational materials remains firmly in place, just as it has been for the past 29 months.

Picture this: its 7:15am, 40-60 children are crammed into a single classroom ready for a new day of learning. Many of them have no exercise books, textbooks or even pencils. This scene repeats itself at 12:15pm, when the “second shift” starts in the same classroom, at the same school, with the same overcrowding and the same shortages (no, this is not Israel in the 1950’s; this is the Gaza Strip in 2009).

A total of 451,704 students went back to school two weeks ago in the Gaza Strip. The new school year promised more of the same struggle to cope, even at school, with the outcomes of the war and the closure imposed by Israel on the Gaza Strip for the past 27 months. For over two years, Israel has refused to allow paper to be imported into the Gaza Strip (except to the UNRWA schools) since paper is not considered “essential for the basic existence of the population.”

The education system, already weakened by the closure, sustained a severe blow when 280 schools and kindergartens were damaged during the war, including 18 schools that were completely destroyed. And there is no possibility of rebuilding them, since cement and building materials are also unnecessary for the “basic existence of the population.” Some 12,000 students who attended the destroyed schools were forced to look for new schools and this has led to an increase in the number of students at other schools, to more than 60 pupils in some classes. At present, almost 90% of the 221 schools operated by the UNRWA in Gaza and more than 80% of the 383 state schools are forced to operate in “shifts” in order to cope with the large number of students.

In the northern Gaza Strip alone, the destruction of 15 schools left 9,000 students without a place to study. Some 4,000 of them were placed in just 2 schools.

At the top of the list of goods that Israel won’t allow into the Gaza Strip are construction materials which can be used to repair the heavy damage sustained during the war and to rebuild the schools that were damaged and destroyed. As billions of dollars earmarked for the reconstruction of the Gaza Strip remain unspent due to Israel’s policies, Israel has chosen a strange way to “teach Gaza a lesson.”