What does it mean for the authority to transfer the salaries of Palestinian workers in Israel to the banks?

Nablus

- A state of tension and anxiety that the Palestinian worker Ahmed Al-Otaibi is still experiencing after the Palestinian Authority - through the Ministry of Labor - announced the transfer of the salaries of Palestinian workers within the Green Line (Israel workers) through Palestinian banks, which may result in Palestinian bank or financial fees, workers in indispensable.

The state of fear experienced by Al-Otaibi, 33, and the thousands of workers - who are in his situation - since the decision was issued a few days ago, is justified, they say, especially as it pursues them in their livelihood and livelihood - through what was reported on their tongues - from the Palestinian government's efforts to impose taxes (income and value). Added) to them, or Palestinian banks charge fees instead of remittances, or turn into a “trap” for the Social Security Fund (currently frozen).

Hitting palm with palm, the young Al-Otaibi - who comes from the governorate of Nablus in the northern West Bank - spoke to Al Jazeera Net about the fear that threatens his livelihood, and says, "There are many discounts on salaries before receiving them without any service provided by the authority to us."

He adds that transferring salaries to banks means monitoring every penny that enters the worker's pocket, and exploiting this as a means of financial deductions from bills or violations that the worker may incur to the authority, as well as other future measures that the authority may take against workers, the most important of which are taxes.

Like Al-Otaibi, the 40-year-old worker, Wadah Muhammad, is afraid of the issue of transferring salaries to banks, and he tells Al Jazeera Net that they are afraid of the authority's intention to re-introduce the issue of the Social Security Fund and to acquire end-of-service benefits and their fees, which "will be invested without the worker benefiting and without his consent or knowledge."

The decision to transfer salaries through banks angered Palestinian workers, and they rose up by the thousands - last Sunday - and announced a comprehensive strike under the title "the strike of dignity" and "the worker is a black line" as a first step at the crossings extending from the north of the West Bank to its south, and they stressed that the escalation is coming unless the crisis is resolved.

The number of Palestinian workers inside "Israel" reaches 220,000 (Al-Jazeera)

Israeli decision

But this is not in the hands of the Palestinian government to stop it, according to the Palestinian Minister of Labor Nasr Abu Jaish, but it is an Israeli decision that has been postponed for months, and it will include everyone who holds a work permit inside Israel, and confirmed that 86,000 workers already have bank accounts and receive their salaries through them, and the new decision will include the rest of the work. Laborers.

Minister Abu Jaish - in his speech to Al Jazeera Net - ruled out embodying what the workers fear by tax deduction or imposing a consideration for transfer, confirming what the Monetary Authority said and stated by Palestinian Prime Minister Muhammad Shtayyeh, and that this was in agreement with the banks.

Abu Jaish accused parties - which he described as "inciters" - mobilizing the workers as a result of the decision, namely, "the Israeli employer and permit brokers from both sides, the Palestinian and the Israeli."

The first is damaged;

Because it is required to pay the worker’s rights in full and not to tamper with the value of the “talush” (salary slip), and the second category are “permit brokers” who will lose 1.2 billion shekels (a dollar equals 3.3 shekels) annually as a result of selling permits to workers at about $800 per month per permit.

Abu Jaish believed that workers would benefit through salary transfers from bank facilities and services, which is also an opportunity for banks to get rid of the "accumulation of shekels", which amounted to about 8 billion shekels, and resulted in large losses for the banks, and for this the minister reveals, "The banks agreed to the transfer without taking commission".

Regarding the workers' fear that the transfer would be a "trap" for the Social Security Fund, Abu Jaish rules out this, and says that the fund, despite its importance, "does not exist now and has not taken anything."

By the way, Abu Jaish adds that since 1970 there have been accumulated funds for workers, and the occupation requires the existence of a retirement institution or social protection fund to pay them.

The number of Palestinian workers "inside Israel" reaches 220,000 (including settlement workers), and they constitute more than 15% of the workforce in Palestine.

Their remittances are estimated at about 18 billion shekels annually, and they constitute about 27% of the Palestinians' gross national income.

Between mistrust and power intent

This crisis, which was provoked by the transfer of salaries, attributes Bakr Shtayyeh, professor of economics at An-Najah University in Nablus, to two parts, one of which is the lack of trust between Palestinian workers in general and the authority as an official institution;

It has "priorities in financial transactions that made it untrustworthy."

The second is the lack of transparency of the authority regarding the file, and its retraction from saying at the beginning that it is a Palestinian and not an Israeli demand as it claims now, and therefore Shtayyeh adds that there are no “fixed policies” for the authority to take decisions or withdraw from them, referring to the Social Security Fund.

However, Shtayyeh does not see any negative effects of transferring salaries through Palestinian banks, and that talking about tax deductions is inaccurate because there is no room for "double taxation."

Shtayyeh added, explaining that Israel deducts taxes from workers before transferring them to them, and then transfers them to the authority through the clearing bill of 75% according to the Paris Economic Protocol, and from settlement workers it returns 100%.

But the Authority’s benefit from the purpose of transferring salaries lies - in Shtayyeh’s opinion - in pumping a large amount of cash into the Palestinian banks, and thus greater liquidity that gives it a higher ability to lend, and the banks become a “big vessel” for the Authority so that it can borrow after it has reached the maximum limit by borrowing from the banking system. .

As for the other aspect, it is represented in the Palestinian-Israeli common interest, which is to reduce the burden of the accumulation of shekels in Palestinian banks, which has caused crises to the Palestinian economy.