Haaretz
Cheshvan 10, 5765
About half of the Palestinian Authority budget
deficit was caused by seizures imposed by Israeli courts on PA funds,
Palestinian sources say.
A PA treasury source says the sum of
confiscated funds reached some NIS 1 billion this month, consisting of
levies, taxes and customs collected by Israel for services and merchandise
intended for the PA.
The cumulative deficit this year is $490
million, while the PA's current budget is $1,444 billion. Palestinian
treasurer Salam Fayyad is expected to cover some $330 million with help
from the donor states, but has not found funding for the remaining $160
million.
Consequently the treasury will not be able to transfer
funds to the pension fund and to the Legislative Council. It may also fall
behind in paying salaries and other current expenses.
The failure
to transfer pension funds will prevent the retirement of some 2,000
security organization employees, whose retirement was one of the reform
requirements demanded of the PA.
Israeli judges usually impose
seizures on Palestinian funds in response to Israeli citizens' damage
suits against the PA in recent years, before the court has reached a
verdict. They do this despite the state's objection, as expressed by the
prosecution and by former director of the prime minister's bureau, Dov
Weisglass.
Attorney Yossi Arnon, representing the PA, said the
suits are much higher than customary. In case of death, Arnon said,
Israeli courts rule up to NIS 1 million for compensation, while in suits
against the PA for terror attacks the sums reach tens of millions of
shekels.
Arnon says that even if some of the plaintiffs win, the
court will allocate them sums similar to those meted in accident suits.
But the seizures imposed on the PA bear no relation to the sums usually
allotted or to the case's chances of success, but to the inflated sums
presented by the suitors.
Some two thirds of the PA's income - $52
million a month - derives from customs, taxes and levies that Israel
transfers to them for merchandise passing through it and various services.
Taxes and customs collected inside the PA provide an additional $25
million.
A source in the donor states told Haaretz the frustration
over the deficit is double, because Fayyad managed to increase the PA's
income this year by 36 percent and raise the the GDP from 22 to 24
percent, mainly due to his resolve to carry out the reforms and after
canceling the fuel monopoly, ensuring that the income goes to the
treasury.
The source said that the Israeli treasury sometimes
transfers the sums collected in the PA earlier than scheduled, so that the
Palestinian treasury can pay wages in time. A source in the Palestinian
treasury said that official Israeli representatives state that despite the
state's objection, they cannot interfere with the courts'
decisions.
At the beginning of last month, the Tel Aviv District
Court accepted the PA's appeal and canceled the confiscation order imposed
a month earlier on NIS 36 million of PA funds. Judge Altuvia Magen said
there are not sufficient grounds for such a sum in the suit presented for
the murder of an Israeli (NIS 80 million).
He also doubted the
grounds for setting the sums in other similar suits, noting that according
to a previous ruling, temporary seizures must not be imposed as a matter
of routine and that the defendant's property rights take precedence over
the appellant's rights, as decided on in the verdict.