The Civil Society Team Statement on the Israeli Occupation Theft of Palestinian Clearance Funds as a Punitive Tool against the Palestinian People
Ramallah- The Civil Society Team for Enhancing Public Budget Transparency (Civil Team) issued a statement regarding the decision taken by the current Israeli occupation government to withhold part of the funds it collects on behalf of the Palestinian Authority (PA) in the form of clearance tax (Maqasa). The occupation’s decision referred to, withholding part of the mentioned funds, is usually allocated in the Palestinian public budget’s revenues to the Gaza Strip (GS), and constitutes one third of the budget’s expenditures. This is a collective punishment act that has been used by the Occupation authority on numerous occasions, as seen by the Civil team. As a matter of fact, the Israeli authority has imposed a freeze on the Maqasa funds more than 10 times since the signing of the Paris Economic Protocol agreement between “Israel” and the PA in 1994.
The PA however, rejected the decision and underlying intent behand it, hence refused to receive the incomplete amount of the clearance funds (Maqasa) altogether. In agreement with the PA, the Civil Team commends and values the position of the PA took in refusing to succumb to Israeli pressure to abandon its obligations towards its people (i.e., Palestinians living in the GS). As the Civil Team is aware of the nature of the difficult times Palestinians are going through following the continued Israeli aggression on the GS, and the ongoing closures, incursions and arrests it carries out in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, in addition to the ongoing vicious settler attacks in the West Bank (WB). It is worth mentioning that the clearance funds cover the expenses of basic services such as health, education and social assistance for more than 120,000 poor families, in addition to the salaries of working and retired employees in the GS.
The Civil Team has repeatedly stressed in its past successive reports that Israel's practice of direct theft or the use of multiple means of leakage contributed to worsening the budget deficit crisis, leading to the loss of up to half a billion dollars annually as a result of Israeli violations of the agreement such as: manipulating import invoices and taxes, smuggling and tax evasion, and the occupation’s disregard of indirect import.
In its position, the Civil Team first stressed that the clearance funds are purely Palestinian funds collected by the Israeli occupation authority on behalf of the PA where it deducts a 3% commission as collection fees. Secondly, the PA has the full right to dispose of the clearance funds (Maqasa) and determine its disbursements in accordance with Palestinian interests. Secondly, the Team called for the need to intensify efforts, resort to international courts, and expose the occupation's unfair and non-transparent financial policies it practices against the PA. Moreover, the Team also stressed that the Israeli occupation must be held accountable for seizing Palestinian funds based on the fact that it is in contravention of the signed agreements.
It also called on the PA government to prepare a contingency plan to correspond with the current situation, which is to reconsider priorities of distributing the public budget, available resources and economic data in order to confront the war waged by the occupation against the Palestinian people. Furthermore, it called on the PA to allocate the necessary financial resources to strengthen the resilience and steadfastness of the Palestinian citizens, especially in the GS.
In a previous letter to His Excellency the Prime Minister Dr. Mohammad Shtayyeh, the Team expressed its full readiness to provide whatever is necessary to contribute to the preparation of the aforementioned plan.
Watch (three parts): How the occupation steals our money
