High-ranking Palestinian and Israeli officials
gathered in a field outside the West Bank city of Jenin on Monday to turn on
the first-ever piece of Palestinian-owned electricity infrastructure and ink a
new electricity agreement between the two sides.
The deal, hailed as “historic” by signatories, will
for the first time set parameters for the supply of power between Israel and
the Palestinian Authority, which for years has seen the PA default on billions
of shekels of debt and Israel subsequently withhold electricity.
After the signing of the agreement, Palestinian
Authority Prime Minister Rami Hamdallah, Israel’s Minister of National
Infrastructure, Energy and Water Resources Yuval Steinitz, Israel Electric
Corporation Chairman Yiftah Ron-Tal and Coordinator of Government Activities in
the Territories Major General Yoav Mordechai together turned on the Al-Jalameh
Substation.
Al-Jalameh is the Jenin-region village nearest to the
station, in the northern West Bank.
The station will allow Israel to send up to 135 more
megawatts to the northern West Bank area, though the agreement currently calls
for just 60 more. The energy will provide a much-needed boost to the Jenin
area, which has suffered power outages more than any other Palestinian West
Bank region.
The station also represents the first time the
Palestinians will be able to control the distribution of the electricity to
their own towns and cities.
The PA will still have to buy its power from the
Israel Electric Corporation. But apart from that, once the power is handed off
to the PA, it’s in Palestinian hands.
When infrastructure breaks down — which once
necessitated Israeli teams escorted by the army to perform repairs, which
inevitably caused delays — Palestinian teams will be responsible for dealing
with any problems.
The station was built by the Israel Electric
Corporation, by both Israeli and Palestinian workers, but it is owned by the
Palestinian Electric Authority (PEA) and the PA. The IEC also trained
Palestinians to work, maintain and fix the site.
Jenin is the first region to receive a substation,
but three more are on the way — in the Hebron region in the south, in the
Ramallah region in the center and in Nablus in the mid-northern West Bank. With
all four stations, the Palestinian Authority will control the power flow across
all the territory it controls.
Hamdallah, the PA prime minister, described the
project as “pivotal to enhance our independence so we can meet the growing
needs of our people in the electricity sector.”
He thanked Israel for “its cooperation to facilitate”
the completion of the project.
These substations are only the first phase in a plan
to make the Palestinians more energy independent.
The document signed on Monday only pertains to the
Jenin area. It is a smaller agreement that is meant to pave the way for a
contract that will deal with the entirety of electricity cooperation between
Israel and the PA.
The Al-Jalameh station, built in three years, was
bought from the IEC for 12 million euros.
The project was partially subsidized by Italy,
Norway, the European Union, USAID, and the European Investment Bank.
In September 2016, the PA and Israel signed an
agreement that transferred control of West Bank electrical infrastructure to
the PA. Under that deal, the PA also began paying off its outstanding power
bill of NIS 2 billion ($560 million).
Three quarters of that is still owed, and is meant to
be paid off in 48 installments.
The contract signed on Monday allows the IEC to
increase electricity supply to the Jenin region without fearing the piling up
of more debt from the Palestinians.
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