The resumed employment of workers from the Gaza Strip in Israel over the last few years – after the suspension following the disengagement in 2005 – was intended to further the relative security calm and restrain Hamas from escalation. After the COVID-19 pandemic ebbed in October 2021, the income of Gazans entering Israel for work grew by more than six-fold, yet approximately one third of these workers paid for entry permits to Israel. Regulation of employment in Israel beginning in August 2022 may harm those employed in the...
Israel surprised Palestinian Islamic Jihad on Friday afternoon, August 5, 2022, when the IDF killed the organization’s commander of the northern Gaza Strip and thwarted units arrayed to attack Israelis in the Gaza perimeter. In the conditions created so far, and particularly with Hamas outside the military campaign, Israel has an interest in a rapid end to the fighting, in spite of its declared readiness for a lengthy campaign. However, it is not clear if it has the ability to revalidate the rules of the game that have applied in the...
This article proposes a relatively simple policy to help the Palestinian Authority improve its dismal fiscal situation: tax Palestinians who work in Israel and in the Israeli settlements by attaching a fixed price to entry permits, instead of taxing them according to the Israeli/Jordanian tax code. The PA should receive all revenues from this tax. This policy would shift the regulation of the number of Palestinian workers away from an exogenously determined quota to a system that takes into account the supply and demand of...
Recent indications suggest that the Palestinian Authority is eager to ease tensions with some Arab Gulf states – tensions that escalated after the Abraham Accords were signed. To be sure, the poor relations and bad blood, especially between PA head Mahmoud Abbas and United Arab Emirates President Mohammed bin Zayed, challenge a fresh start anytime soon. Nonetheless, the recent developments, insofar as they suggest a turning point in relations between the parties, are likely to have a considerable impact on the Palestinian arena and...
Infrastructure and sanitation conditions in the Gaza Strip, one of the world’s most densely populated areas, are extremely poor, including shortages of water, energy, electricity, food, and health services. Gaza’s humanitarian challenge is likely to only worsen, given the demographic trends in the Strip and its acute vulnerability to climate change. While the defense establishment in Israel and the international community are aware of the gordian knot between the humanitarian situation and the security threat emanating from Gaza,...
The Jenin area has recently emerged as a breeding ground of terrorism and a relatively easy and free theater of action for Islamic Jihad, the largest and strongest active organization there. The Israeli defense establishment has marked this area as an extremely dangerous problem and has elected to focus its offensive effort there. In essence, however, this effort amounts to no more than extinguishing local fires. This activity makes it possible to thwart individual terrorist actions – the importance of which should not be discounted...
A cognitive campaign is taking place between Hamas and Israel, that is, a campaign over determining the “narrative” that will dictate the perception of the achievements of each side in the local, regional, and even global arenas. Hamas is investing great effort to inflate its image of power vis-à-vis Israel as it beleaguers Israel in five arenas: the organization is threatening rocket fire and terrorist actions from the Gaza Strip, presenting itself as the defender of al-Aqsa in Jerusalem, operating “resistance” activists in the...
The terrorist attacks in Bnei Brak, Tel Aviv, and Elad by undocumented workers brought to the fore the phenomenon of workers’ easy entry into Israel through the barrier between Israel and the West Bank and their stay in Israel without permits. In fact, the number of undocumented workers in Israel has increased from about 20,000 on the eve of the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic to about 40,000 in most of 2021, mainly due to workers switching from documented employment to undocumented employment. It is likely that Israeli policy...
The events of Ramadan 2022 have illustrated the potential volatility surrounding the al-Aqsa Mosque, and have emphasized again that al-Aqsa and the Temple Mount compound have become a main focus in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. In the face of the violence, Israel has waged tactical holding and containment battles, without understanding that this is a new struggle over sovereignty over the Temple Mount. In recent years there has been an erosion of the Temple Mount status quo understandings, particularly with an increase in the...
The escalation in the Israeli-Palestinian arena, ongoing for over a month, is the product of a process planned and orchestrated by Hamas several months before Ramadan. As a lesson from the conflict of May 2021, Hamas sought to use the holy sites in East Jerusalem to foment a mass protest that would once again muster Palestinian solidarity in Jerusalem, throughout the West Bank, and in Israeli territory. Although the masses did not respond to the call, the organization gained achievements in three areas: the Palestinian issue returned...
Two of the attacks in the current wave of terror were carried out by three Arab citizens of Israel who identified with ISIS / Islamic State. However, the organization has not gained a grip on the Arab public in Israel, and while predictably it took credit for the attacks, it was not involved beyond providing inspiration. The assessment is that these trends are not expected to change. Noteworthy is the comprehensive public condemnation by Israel’s Arab citizens of the recent attacks, and above all, the condemnation of the attacks...
The recent terror events in Israel can be examined through two prisms. Perhaps this is a wave of terror, of limited duration and not indicative of a fundamental systemic change. Alternatively, a systemic approach suggests that this is a terror campaign waged by Hamas, in coordination with Islamic Jihad and with Iranian support, which aims to unite the fronts of the Palestinian struggle against Israel in a comprehensive campaign that is a joint “resistance” effort of the various factions. Israel should adopt a strategy...
