A Palestinian Bedouin man walks with his camels in one of the poorest areas of the northern Gaza Strip. (Wesam Saleh, Maan Images)

This is crunch time for the new emergency government. It knows all too well that it has a small window of opportunity to prove its ability to pull the Palestinians back from the throes of poverty and social and political disintegration.

With Hamas still ruling the streets of Gaza and mutual accusations between this party and Fateh over who is to blame for the current state of misery, President Mahmoud Abbas and new Prime Minister Salaam Fayyad are placing their bets on hard currency – the euros, greenbacks and riyals they know is the key to their survival.

It was long ago when the Palestinians fell into the trap of international funding – basically, the signing of the Oslo Accords marked the first paycheck handed to the fledgling Palestinian Authority at the expense of their ultimate freedom over their own destiny.

Since then, the West Bank and Gaza Strip have been prisoners to this financial assistance. When the political leadership was favorable to the funders – mainly the United States and Europe – the dollars flowed.

During the decade after the PA was created with Fateh at the helm, investment in the Palestinian territories boomed and life in the West Bank and Gaza took on a semblance of normalcy, to the point where the Palestinians almost forget that their main and most challenging task was still at hand– eliminating Israeli rule over their land.

Related stories Gaza: From economic to humanitarian disaster The follies of US policy in Palestine FAQ on the Gaza crisis In search of justice in the Middle East John Bisharat: Composer and conductor

However, the makings of a subordinate Palestinian entity had been securely put in place, one which would be forced to rely on external funding for as long as this remained in the interests of the powers that be – i.e. Israel and the United States. And while the majority of Palestinians were still unaware of the extent of this subordination, mostly because their leadership had convinced them that they were well on their way to independence, it did not take long for the true nature of this arrangement to rise to the surface.

Once the Palestinians signed the politically and economically binding Oslo Accords they had inadvertently put themselves at the mercy of Israeli and American dictates, including how much money comes into the Palestinian territories and how it is disbursed. After late President Yasser Arafat passed away in 2004, and the political winds shifted towards a more Islamist trend, the valves on the flow of international funding began to tighten.

However, it was not until Hamas took power after its sweeping victory in the January 2006 Legislative Council elections and later formed the government that funding came to a standstill. The United States, Israel and Europe all consider Hamas as a “terrorist organization” and not a suitable “partner for peace” for the Israelis.

So, as punishment for the Palestinians’ democratic choice, the funders imposed a strangulating economic boycott on the Palestinian Authority, completely halting all aid directly to the Authority and limiting assistance to relief efforts.

The results, no doubt, have been devastating on the leadership and the people alike.

To read the full article please visit MIFTAH.org.