New Restrictions on Palestinians Aim to "Judaize" the Israeli Workforce

By Bryce Giddens

Dusk was falling in Jerusalem as Azmi, a 27-year-old West Bank construction worker, returned home from his second day back on the job. He knew he was lucky. After 47 days of unemployment since the Gulf war began, he had obtained a work permit from the Israeli Civil Administration and resumed work at a building site in West Jerusalem. Now his main concern was getting safely to his home in Al-Amari refugee camp, near Ramallah. The nightly curfew on the occupied territories had gone into effect almost an hour earlier, and from the front seat of the taxi he was keeping his eyes peeled for the army. "It's like a prison here," he muttered.

"It's Like a Prison Here"

Scenes like this have become commonplace in the West Bank and Gaza Strip since the Gulf war ended. The six-week curfew imposed during the war is over, but life in the occupied territories continues to be regulated by a strict regime of permits, checkpoints and curfews. Designed to wean Israel of its dependence on Palestinian labor, while bringing the population of the occupied territories under even greater Israeli control, the permit system has immobilized the Palestinian economy and pushed the Palestinian unemployment rate to over 50 percent. Although Israeli government spokespersons claim that life in the occupied territories has returned to normal, the new restrictions are only beginning to take their toll on the Palestinian population.

The most serious hardship has been the massive reduction in the number of Palestinians allowed to work in Israel. Before the Gulf war, some 120,000 residents of the occupied territories crossed the Green Line daily to work in Israel, mostly in menial jobs in the construction, agriculture and service sectors. About 40,000 were registered with the labor offices of the Civil Administration, hence subject to Israeli income taxes, while the rest worked illegally, often on a daily wage basis.

Since the curfew was lifted, however, all work in Israel has been made conditional on obtaining a work permit from the Civil Administration. The number of Palestinians entering Israel to work accordingly fell dramatically, with fewer than 25,000 crossing the Green Line daily in the weeks following the curfew. On March 17, a "security ban" keeping workers out of the Tel Aviv and Haifa areas was lifted. Even after that, the daily total of workers crossing to Israel did not exceed 50,000. A blanket night curfew on the occupied territories, confining all Palestinian residents to their homes between 5 pm and 6 am, limits the hours that laborers can work.

The process of obtaining a permit also is fraught with difficulties. To be eligible, workers must be legally registered with the labor offices, and their Israeli employers must submit their names to the Civil Administration. The workers' files are thoroughly checked, and those with security records or tax debts are rejected.

When issued, the permits are good only for travel to and from the Israeli workplace, and are valid only for periods ranging from two days to two months, after which the worker must reapply. They do not allow the workers to take their cars across the Green Line, thereby forcing them to rely on the employer for transportation. To ensure that Palestinians without permits do not enter Israel, Police Commissioner Ya'akov Terrier ordered an increase in patrols in Israeli cities. Under these conditions, it is virtually impossible for unemployed Palestinians to seek new jobs in the Israeli sector.

Ibrahim, a 20-year-old construction worker from the West Bank village of Deir Bizi'a, is one of the thousands of Palestinian workers kept from working since Jan. 16 because of the new restrictions. The work permit he was issued, after a week of standing in line at the Civil Administration office, is not valid until he submits the license number of the Israeli car he will travel in to his job in Rehovot. But his Israeli employer has refused to send a car, and Ibrahim does not have access to another. The employer is withholding two months of Ibrahim's wages, telling him he won't get paid unless he comes to Rehovot to pick up the money. Without the $20 per day Ibrahim earned before the war, his family has had to borrow money, and may have to sell some of their land. "I've looked around for work in the West Bank, but there are a lot of people unemployed here already," he says.

The permit system is enforced mainly by means of army checkpoints erected on all roads connecting the occupied territories to Israel. Vehicles with West Bank or Gaza license plates require separate permits, and are turned back even if the driver or his passengers are allowed to pass. Verbal abuse, beatings and other forms of harassment are not infrequent.

"The soldier said, 'I want to look at your face,' and made me stand for two hours," said one West Banker. More importantly, the checkpoints encircle Israeli-annexed East Jerusalem, effectively barring the majority of West Bank Palestinians from the place where most of their national institutions, religious sites and cultural life are located.

Movement within the West Bankis inhibited as well, because the Arab side of the city is the main transit point for travel between the West Bank's northern and southern halves.

The livelihoods of the 22,000 West Bankers working in East Jerusalem before the Gulf war have also been jeopardized. Khaled, a Bethlehem resident working as a hairdresser in Jerusalem, now comes to work only two to three days per week instead of the usual six, with a corresponding loss of income. "If I want to get a permit I have to pay taxes, but I don't have money to pay taxes because I can't work," he said.

Taking Chances

Desperate for jobs, many Palestinians without permits have taken to skirting the checkpoints in order to work in Israel illegally. Nasser and Ayyoub, two brothers from 'Ezzariya village, spent two months unemployed before deciding to take their chances and return to their jobs at a candy factory in nearby Ma'ale Adumim settlement, part of Israeli-annexed Jerusalem. To avoid the checkpoint on the road to the settlement, they have to take a circuitous mountain route, increasing their commuting time from 10 minutes to one hour. Their boss at the candy factory was glad to have them back, but said he didn't have time to request permits for them. "Because of this, we have to take risks to go to work" said Ayyoub. "but if we don't work, we can't eat."

Others have had less luck returning to jobs in Israel, The wartime curfew and the permit system have made the supply of Palestinian laborers unreliable, making it profitable for Israeli employers to replace them with Jewish workers previously considered too expensive. Co-op, a marketing firm owned by the Israeli labor union, the Histadrut, fired all 60 of its West Bank workers during the Gulf war and hired Soviet Jews in their place. The Israeli national bus company, Egged, has laid off 200 Palestinian workers from the Gaza Strip alone. Khana Zohar of the Workers' Hotline, an Israeli organization for the defense of Palestinian workers' rights, believes the true goal of the permit system is to Judaize the work force in Israel. "They say it's for security but I think it's a lie," she said. "In my opinion, the only reason is to leave jobs open for new immigrants."

Meanwhile, the high rate of unemployment is putting the squeeze on the already weakened Palestinian economy. Samir Huleileh, an economic consultant for the Geneva-based Welfare Association, notes that the restrictions on work in Israel are aggravating the severe lack of money in the occupied territories. After Aug. 2, Palestinians suffered a sharp drop in remittances from relatives working in the Gulf states, then saw most of their savings evaporate during the curfew. As a result, says Huleileh, "people are not consuming and producers are not producing. I can easily say we're in a state of total collapse." The West Bank construction sector and its 20,000 workers are at a standstill, and shopkeepers report that business is terrible. "We're just opening the store and waiting for one or two people to come in," complained one Ramallah clothing salesman. "And when they buy, they buy only the cheapest things."

A Grim Future

Barring any change in the restrictions on work in Israel or investment in the local Palestinian economy, the future of the occupied territories appears grim. Shaher Sa'ad, head of the General Federation of Trade Unions in the West Bank, believes the current economic situation will soon have political ramifications. "It's frightening when the workers can't find means to support themselves," he says. "If these conditions continue, the level of violence in the West Bank and Gaza Strip will escalate."

Bryce Giddens, a free-lance US journalist, has been living in the occupied territories for the past 18 months.