Palestinian workers stand in the empty arrivals hall at Gaza International Airport, which has been closed since Israel destroyed its runway in 2001. (Maan Images)

Every morning, Mosbeh El Najear reports for work at Gaza's International Airport, ready to frisk passengers for weapons, check baggage for bombs, and make sure every plane is safe before it takes off.

The security guard, 36, is almost a perfect employee: perfect because he hasn't missed a day in nearly 10 years; almost, because the last plane out of here left on Feb. 13, 2001, the day before the Israeli army destroyed the tarmac, rendering it useless.

Since then, Najear and some 500 other airport employees have been paid to do nothing.

Luggage handlers, air traffic controllers and other airport workers are all listed on the Palestinian Authority payroll, earning about $400 a month for jobs that don't really exist.

"We all collect salaries, but we don't exactly work," said Najear, shifting uncomfortably in the bombed-out wreckage of what used to be the arrivals hall.

As foreign donors consider lifting their year-long embargo on the Palestinian Authority, this tiny airport near the Egyptian border - which donors have been reluctant to rebuild without a guarantee from Israel that it wouldn't attack again - is often cited as a prime example of Gaza's economic dependence and wasted potential.

But now, under a new Palestinian restoration plan, it is also emerging as a symbol of hope.

"The plans are ready to go. All we need is a political decision and, of course, the money," said Saadi al-Krunz, the new Palestinian transport minister.

An $86-million threat

The Dahaniya airport was opened in 1998, built with $86 million in foreign aid.

For three years, it handled daily flights to destinations including Cairo, Amman, Dubai, Morocco and Cyprus.

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"It was the most beautiful place in all of Gaza. Kings and presidents have flown through here," said Salman Abu Halib, chairman of the Palestinian Civil Aviation Authority, as he strolled past a charred luggage carousel recently.

But Israel has long considered the airport a security threat. Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert once worried that Palestinian planes would be used to carry weapons. "How can you control the airplanes that will land in Gaza carrying, for instance, missiles?" he said at an economic forum in Jordan in May 2005 when he was Ariel Sharon's deputy prime minister.

The Israelis first targeted the airport at the beginning of the second intifada, destroying a runway.

The entire airport was hit after the kidnapping of Israeli Cpl. Gilad Shalit last summer.

The place is now a shadow of its former self. The tarmac is piled high with rubble. On breezy days, huge chunks of scrap metal dangling from a hangar roof whine in the wind. The Palestinian Airline fleet of two Fokkers and a Boeing 727 languishes in Amman.

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