Will PA Terror Policy Kill the Economic Peace?

This question is asked by Dan Diker in a recent op ed

The double execution-style murders last week of Kim Levengrond Yehezkel and Ziv Hajbi at the Barkan Industrial Park took place in the aftermath of the recent fatal stabbing of Ari Fuld in the Gush Etzion commercial center. In both cases, the Palestinian terrorists, ages 23 and 17 respectively, carried out their assaults not in “settlements,” but in two of 16 industrial and commercial zones in Judea and Samaria – the “West Bank” where Palestinians and Israelis live, work and shop. These young men murdered Israelis in order to resist a growing Palestinian middle-class cooperation and normalization, in which tens of thousands of Palestinian families have chosen to shape their future by cooperating with Israel and living and working with Israelis.

Palestinian leaders and professionals living in towns and villages in areas C have expressed shame and sorrow quietly over terrorist acts such as these, as well as their inability to say so publicly. They have expressed disgust with their own corrupt and terror-supporting Palestinian Authority leaders who incentivize young Palestinians to murder Jews with more than $315 million annually, and whose official PA political and public culture and media incite them to murder Jews.   

While the  Israeli security forces are still investigating the circumstances of the Barkan atrocity, one link already seems clear: Both young terrorists are bound by the fear and rejection that the bottom-up economic normalization has created an irreversible economically driven “revolution of interests,” as former PLO leader Hani al-Hassan put it. The painful paradox of growing Palestinian-Israeli economic normalization mixed with intolerable Palestinian assaults underscores the importance of Israeli sovereignty and security in Area C. It further exposes the deepening chasm between the PA and the terrorists they support and glorify on the one hand, with the silent and silenced majority of Palestinians who see their economic and political futures linked to Israel, as opposed to a failed, corrupt Palestinian Authority.
As the standard of living for Palestinians has increased some 300% per wage-earner in Israeli-controlled, protected and administered area C, compared with the average annual salary in the Palestinian-controlled areas, the PLO and PA’s blood pressure increases.

Some 100,000 Palestinians commute to work in “pre-1967 Israel” every day, while some 30,000 Palestinians work in the Israeli-administered area C of Judea and Samaria, which is also protected by Israeli Labor laws for both Palestinian and Israeli workers. Palestinains to seek a future with Israel and Israeli companies. SodaStream and Rami Levy serve as good examples of harmonious work cultures and advantaged compensation policies that are driving Palestinian employment, prosperity, career development and political normalization that all threaten the Palestinian leadership’s perpetual hold on power.

In short, ongoing Palestinian terrorism has boomeranged against the Palestinian leadership. The silent Palestinian majority has linked its economic and political future to Israel and given up on its own leadership as an economic anchor and political solution.

Even Peace Activists Not Safe in Ramallah

By Abra Forman June 30, 2016

In a turn of events which doesn’t bode well for their mission of coexistence, a group of nine Jewish Israeli peace activists were evacuated from the de-facto Palestinian capital city of Ramallah on Wednesday night after residents set their car on fire.

The activists belong to the leftist group “Two States, One Homeland” and deliberately entered Ramallah in order to join Palestinian activists in a Ramadan iftar break-fast meal, said the IDF. The visit violated a military order which forbids Israeli citizens from entering West Bank towns located in the Palestinian Authority-controlled Area A.

When locals realized the activists were Israeli, they attacked the group with rocks and firebombs and one of their cars was set ablaze, leading to a hasty extraction of the group.

Eight of the activists left Ramallah through the Qalandia crossing, and the ninth was rescued by Palestinian Security Services. He was detained and questioned before being handed over to Israeli control near the Beit El checkpoint, Ynet reported.

The group’s response was subdued. In a statement, the organization noted, “It appears one of our vehicles was set on fire and was slightly damaged while it was empty.”

The statement went on to defend the Palestinian security forces, saying, “The Palestinian security services quickly took control of the incident and helped us file a complaint.”

Despite media reports, which suggested the activists had made a lucky escape, the group insisted that “at no point did we feel threatened and our Palestinian friends were horrified by the incident.”

The IDF said that the nine are currently under investigation for violating the military order to stay out of Area A.

“Two States, One Homeland” calls for “the establishment of two sovereign states in one, open, land”, with citizens from both states able to live in either one while retaining their nationalities. Under its vision, Jerusalem would be a bi-national capital for both countries, and all holy sites would be jointly managed by “representatives of the different religions”.