The new wave of terror may be hurting the Palestinian economy

The Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics published its labor report for the second quarter, and it shows that the number of Palestinians working in Israel and the settlements increased to 164,000 from 153,000 in the first quarter.

However, this is not the highest number for Palestinians working for Israelis. It reversed a year-long trend of fewer Palestinians working for Israelis.

In the second quarter last year, some 211,000 Palestinians worked for Israelis - 182,000 in the Green Line and 29,000 in the settlements. That number decreased by 13,000 between the second and third quarters.

A drop from 211,000 to 153,000 in less than a year is a dramatic change, before the modest rebound this quarter.

The Israeli GDP has continued to steadily increase during this time period so this drop doesn't seem to be a reflection of more general economic trends. 

It seems likely that as terror attacks increased over the past 18 months that Israeli employers are getting more skittish about hiring Palestinians, worried that some workers might go on a murder spree.

Obviously, only a tiny percentage of Palestinian workers are potential terrorists. But there have been enough incidents of Palestinian workers in Israel who either instigated or facilitated terror attacks in Israel to make Israeli employers think twice before hiring. 

Given that Israeli employers pay far higher salaries than Palestinian employers - this quarter the average daily wage increased to NIS 289, far more than double the Palestinian average - the "heroic Palestinian youth" of Jenin and Nablus appear to be making the lives of ordinary Palestinians worse.

But there are no true brave Palestinian who are willing to say that out loud.

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Gazans die in boat disaster off Tunisia. Guess who Hamas blames?

In October, at least eight Palestinians died when their the boat they were on to try to enter Europe sank off the coast of Tunisia.

Their bodies were returned to Gaza over the weekend and their funerals were held.

Hazem Qassem, a spokesman for the Hamas movement, said, "We  mourn the martyrs of the siege who were killed off the Tunisian coast, and we extend our sincere condolences and great sympathy to their honorable families, asking God Almighty to grant them patience and solace."

In a press statement Sunday, Qassem held Israel fully responsible for their deaths.

Gazans, however, blamed a different party: Hamas itself.

“The government that governs us here is the reason. It’s to blame. It’s to blame,” said Naheel Shaath, whose 21-year-old son Adam was among the dead. “I blame all officials here who don’t care for the youths or provide job opportunities for them.”

“Our children are drowning in the sea and their children are enjoying luxury. Isn’t this unfair?” Mrs. Shaath said.

Another family, the al-Shaers, buried their son, 21-year-old Mohammed. But his younger brother Maher, 20, is still missing. They were on the same doomed boat.

Their mother, Amina, blamed Hamas for the family's misery.

“What do we see in Gaza? We only see oppression," she said. "They are suffocating the youth and the youth flee because of their suffocation.”

Hamas wants to blame Israel to take off the heat from itself. Jews, of course, are the natural targets for blame. And Palestinians know when they are being manipulated by their own leaders. 

The route that took the Gazans to that boat was quite circuitous. They went to Turkey, presumably by air since Turkey accepts Gazans, but instead of trying their luck there, they went from Turkey to Egypt, traveled to Libya, and then tried to cross the Mediterranean a third time, hoping to eventually make it to Belgium.

Turkey is supposedly very hospitable for Palestinians, so it is strange that they went from Turkey back to Egypt. Presumably they flew to Turkey from Cairo after crossing the Gaza border at Rafah. 

There is more to this story, perhaps Palestinians are not as welcome in Turkey as we are told. 

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Survey shows antisemitism is widespread in the workplace, Jews are less likely to be hired

ResumeBuilders commissioned a survey of antisemitic attitudes of hiring managers and recruiters in the United States, and the results show that discrimination against Jews in the workplace is far more widespread than has been reported.

Nearly one third of the respondents, 32%, said antisemitism is "common" or "very common" at their workplaces.

Over a quarter of them, 26%, say they are less likely to move forward in the hiring process with Jewish applicants.

23% say they want fewer Jews in their industry, and an astounding 17% say that their leadership has told them to not hire Jews. 

The recruiters and hiring managers make assumptions on who is Jewish based on the applicant’s educational background (35%), last name (33%), past or current experiences with Jewish organizations (28%), and even their appearance (26%). But some also make their assumptions based on antisemitic criteria, saying their assumptions are based on the job applicant's  “voice,” “mannerisms,” or even saying “they are very frugal.”

When asked the reasons for not wanting to hire Jews, the answers were a summary of why people are antisemitic altogether. They included "Jews have too much power and control" (38%), "Jews claim to be the ‘chosen people’" (38%), and "Jews have too much wealth" (35%).

Is this discrimination coming from the political Right or the Left? The reasons given above seem to indicate it is the former, but that is not necessarily so.

The report notes that antisemitism is worse in industries that tend to be more politically liberal and that  people traditionally associated with Jews. 48% of hiring managers in both education and entertainment say antisemitism is common at their workplace, while 45% of hiring managers in business say antisemitism is acceptable in their workplace.

Moreover, Resumebuilder has had other surveys done recently of recruiters and hiring managers, and the results showed that they tend to lean left. 

More than one-third of hiring managers are more likely to interview applicants who list their pronouns in their resumes. Additionally, 52% believe their company practices “reverse discrimination” in hiring; 1 in 6 have been asked to deprioritize hiring white men and 48% have been asked to prioritize diversity over qualifications. 

It may be that the combination of companies demanding a more diverse environment and  hiring managers' latent antisemitic attitudes work together to provide a perfect storm against hiring Jews, with diversity being used as a way for the managers to justify their antisemitic practices. 

For comparison, studies show less than 10% bias against applicants who appear to be Black. Those results garner major headlines. 

It is unclear what the geographic scope of the survey was. Resumebuilder itself is geared towards jobs in the United States. (I requested more data.)

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Buy the EoZ book, PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism  today at Amazon! Or order from your favorite bookseller, using ISBN 9798985708424.  Read all about it here!

 

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The best insurance against a third intifada: 19% of Palestinian labor market employed by Israelis

The second quarter Palestinian labor statistics show that there are 903,000 Palestinians working in the West Bank and Gaza, 182,000 who work in Israel and 29,000 who work in the settlements.

This means that 18.9% of Palestinians are employed directly by Israelis. 

This is, by far, the highest percentage of Palestinians working for Israelis in at least ten years, and possibly since before Oslo.  I sampled some previous years: In 2021, the percentage was less than 16%; in 2016, 13%; in 2012, 10.4%.

This doesn't include Palestinians who are indirectly employed by Israel, for example, those who work for local computer consultants who get most of their work from Israelis.

If one out of every five Palestinians works for Israelis, that is a significant number of people who will not want a new intifada that would jeopardize their jobs.

And neither would any Palestinian leader, in the West Bank at least. Because the 19% only tells half the story. The average wage for those who work for Israelis is typically more than double that of local Palestinian workers. I estimate that over 35% of all wages to Palestinian workers comes from Israeli employers.

A third intifada would destroy the Palestinian economy and anger the 211,000 Palestinians who work - or hope to work - in Israel. 

This is why Israel is trying to expand work permits to Gaza. The same logic applies, and even Hamas would not be eager to upset a labor force that desperately wants to work.

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Buy the EoZ book, PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism  today at Amazon! Or order from your favorite bookseller, using ISBN 9798985708424.  Read all about it here!

 

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Jordanian Islamist party warns against Jordanians working in Eilat

The Islamic Action Front, the Jordanian political arm of the Muslim Brotherhood, has warned of the "danger" of allowing hundreds of Jordanian youth to work in Eilat.

They said that this normalization somehow poses a threat to Jordanian national security.

The issued a statement that "rejects the attempts of the Zionist entity to infiltrate Jordanian society and pass the normalization approach by exploiting the youth's need for work and money."

As far as I can tell, the IAF is worried that Jordanians working in Israel will see Jews as something other than monsters. They warn about "the security risks of Jordanian youth working with the occupation and trying to influence them to serve its goals."

The poor, misguided youth of Jordan apparently can be easily influenced to become more Zionist by merely working for and getting paid by Jews under good working conditions and higher salaries than they can get in Jordan.

The statement ended affirming that "the Zionist entity will remain the nation's number one enemy."

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Buy the EoZ book, PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism  today at Amazon! Or order from your favorite bookseller, using ISBN 9798985708424.  Read all about it here!

 

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Jordanian groups now try to get others to boycott jobs in Eilat

Ever notice how antisemitic boycotts are meant to make other people sacrifice things, but the organizers never have to do without anything important?

Now, Jordanian antisemites are telling thousands of other Jordanians not to work in Israel, with good salaries and working conditions!

The group "I Move to Support the Resistance and Counter Normalization" (these groups always have really long names)  warned Jordanian workers who had commuted to jobs in Eilat not to return as the jobs return, post-COVID. 

Some 2000 hotel workers and 300 other workers from Jordan are slated to return to working in Israel on August 1.

In a statement issued by the group, they called not to go to work in Israel, as well as to boycott the recruitment companies in Jordan that act as go-betweens. 

Ludicrously, the group is claiming that working in Israel with good salaries and decent working conditions "constitutes an exploitation of their conditions and their need to work, and includes labor violations that amount to human trafficking."

Hence, the logo above.

If the jobs are so exploitative, then no one has to accept them, do they?

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Buy the EoZ book, PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism  today at Amazon! Or order from your favorite bookseller, using ISBN 9798985708424.  Read all about it here!

 

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The Sodastream irony

If you put together everything that every "pro-Palestinian "activist has ever done for actual, real Palestinians....

If you tally all the specific things that Omar Barghouti and Max Blumenthal and Philip Weiss and Ali Abuminah and Greta Berlin and Ben White and every single member of Free Gaza, Mondoweiss, Electronic Intifada, the BDS Movement, Students for Justice in Palestine, the ISM and others have done to improve the daily lives of Palestinian Arabs over the past twenty years....

You would not approach what Sodastream does for Palestinian Arab families every single day.

Which of these hypocrites are trying to build a factory in Ramallah or Nablus or Jericho that employs 900 workers and pays them good wages? Who among them is working to increase Palestinian exports of goods and services to the huge Arab markets? Who among them is working to create a high-tech Palestinian hub where they could charge Arab nations for their remote services - industries that require little space and can pay well?

Who among them gives a damn about the Palestinians they claim to work on behalf of?

They don't.

To them, Palestinians are props for their anti-Israel stunts. They are nothing more than pawns. Any Arab that cannot be used as ammunition against Israel is ignored or derided as a collaborator. Any happy Arab employee who works in Mishor Adumin or Atarot Industrial Park is  an enemy of their cause.

You know how many stories about BDS are in Arabic media? Practically none. Because Arabs aren't being helped one bit by the vitriolic campaign against an Israeli company that does more for Arabs than every "pro-Palestinian" activist combined.

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More hypocrisy and lies from the BDS crowd. Pretty funny, actually.

Another day, another new initiative to boycott Israel:

Activists are gearing up for a day of action on 9 February that will target Israeli agricultural export companies such as Mehadrin and Hadakalim over their role in Israeli settlements and the dispossession of Palestinian farmers.

In a statement titled “Farming Injustice” released earlier this month, all major Palestinian agricultural organizations called for “the launching of worldwide campaigns on 9 February against Israeli agricultural export corporations in light of their deep complicity in Israel’s ongoing violations of international law and Palestinian human rights.”

Once again, a bunch of tiny self-proclaimed leaders who pretend to speak for all Palestinian Arab farmers are saying that they want to kill the farms, since the bulk of exports from the Palestinian Arab territories use Israeli exporters.

The reality is, of course, quite different, as real Palestinian Arab farmers work closely with Israel in order to maximize their efficiencies and profits:

On Tuesday (29.1), the Civil Administration coordinated and funded the departure of about 150 Palestinians agriculture workers from Judea and Samaria to the exhibition "Cleantech" - the 17th annual international event for water technologies, energy efficiency , renewable energy, green building , recycling and green transportation, that take place at the Israel Trade Fairs and Conventions Center, Tel-Aviv.. Through the exhibition, the Agriculturists explored the developments in green agricultural.

This conference joins a seminar on the use of reclaimed water for agriculture, conducted by the Civil Administration agriculture office two weeks ago (January 15 to 17). During the seminar, 22 representatives from the Palestinian Ministry of Agriculture were informed on the use of reclaimed water for agriculture, due to the growing shortage of fresh water for irrigation in the area and to increase the knowledge and awareness of this issue in the Palestinians agriculture farms in Judea and Samaria.

In addition, the Civil Administration agriculture officer, Mr Samir Muadi, held last week (24.1) a meeting with Israel's olive sector manager and with the advisor to the Palestinian Minister of Agriculture, following meeting held in October regarding the Palestinian olive sector. During those two meetings, it was decided on marketing Olive Oil from the Palestinian Authority to Israel, as the olive sector is a central and important sector of the Palestinian agriculture.

In addition, the Gaza DCO coordinated the departure of about 60 agriculture workers from the Gaza Strip to the annual agricultural exhibition of the Arava research and development (R & D) unit held at Yair Station on Wednesday and Thursday (January 30 to 31). The exhibition was attended by representatives of the agricultural crop sectors in Israel and overseas delegations. During the exhibition, displaying crops and technological developments in the field of agriculture, the Gaza DCO agricultural coordinator visit the greenhouses at Ein Yahav that grow tomatoes, peppers, etc.

I don't know who these farmers are if they are cooperating with Israel and defying the "agricultural organizations" whose entire purpose is anti-Israel and whose websites often have nothing to say about farming.

One part of the screed was interesting:

Earlier Corporate Watch research had shown that Palestinians forced to work in packing houses controlled by Mehadrin are paid as little as 56 shekels ($15) per day.

They are forced to work for Mehadrin? is it at gunpoint, or does their employer use whips and keep them in chains?

And what evidence is there that they are being paid $15 a day? Well, three years ago, an anti-Israel organization asked a few Arab workers who were willing to speak to them what they were paid. That's the "proof."

If it is true, then Mehadrin  may be breaking the law according to this organization. I'm not aware of any lawsuits brought by "Corporate Watch" on their behalf, though. It must not have been very important.

There are a couple of funny parts about this complaint. One can presume that most Jordan Valley workers for Israeli companies are employed without permits. Companies argue that employment law should follow Jordanian law, not Israeli law, which is how they justify giving a lower salary to those without permits. Yet 2011 statistics show that the poor salaries that Palestinian Arab workers get for illegally working for Israeli companies is roughly the average salary of West Bank Palestinian Arabs who work for Arabs! So while it is possible that Mehadrin or others are not paying the rates they should, it is apparent that the Palestinian Arab workers are getting the market rates, and they are hardly being "forced" to work for the hated Jews.

They can always quit!

But even funnier is that anti-Israel organizations don't usually complain that the Jews are paying the Palestinian Arabs too little - but that they pay too much! The same 2011 article notes:

The increase in the percentage of those employed in settlements does not fit with the Palestinian Authority (PA) plan to completely prevent Palestinian labourers from working in settlements, and to render such work illegal as of 2012. Originally the PA intended to impose punishments of up to five years imprisonment and financial penalties of some US $14,000. The Palestinian Minister of Labour Ahmad Majdalani noted in December 2010 that his ministry is cooperating with the national economic office to establish a fund for loans to workers employed in settlements.

...An additional reason for the increase in the level of those employed in settlements is the large gap between the salary in the Palestinian sector and that in settlements. While the average daily salary in the West Bank stands at NIS 76.9 and in Gaza NIS 46.2, a Palestinian worker in a settlement earns an average of NIS 150 daily.

In short:

• The BDSers want Palestinian Arab farmers to lose millions of dollars that they are making today by cooperating with Israeli exporters.
• The BDSers want Palestinian Arabs to stop working for Israelis that pay them double the rates they would get from Arab employers.
• The actual farmers in the territories are happy to work with Israel to make money.
• The actual workers in the settlements are happy to get more money for their families by legally working for Israelis.

The disconnect between the BDSers and the people they pretend to care about can hardly be any starker. 

The explanation, of course, is the same explanation that answers nearly every Middle East enigma involving Israel since 1948: the people who pretend to be "pro-Palestinian" are really just against the rights of Jews to have any political power or self-determination. 

Once you understand that, the inconsistencies fall away.

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