Israel may bar Palestinian workers

TEL AVIV, Israel -- The Israeli government is considering a plan that would prohibit Palestinians from working within Israel's borders, according to two senior Israeli officials.

The proposal comes as the international community is trying to bolster the Palestinian economy in the West Bank and Gaza.

Unemployment and poverty there have soared since the Palestinian intifada, or uprising, began in September 2000.

Israeli national security adviser Giora Eiland linked the move away from employing Palestinians inside Israel to the country's planned withdrawal of Jewish settlements in Gaza and parts of the northern West Bank this summer.

The goal is to "reduce mutual dependence" between Israelis and Palestinians, Eiland said in an interview Sunday. "For us, it is too dangerous" to allow Palestinians to enter the country when Israeli security officials regularly apprehend would-be attackers at border crossings.

Vice Premier Shimon Peres, speaking Tuesday in an interview before leaving for the United States to promote economic aid for the Palestinians, said freezing out Palestinian workers "doesn't make any sense," but he confirmed that Israeli planners have discussed the idea.

"That was offered to the government, but it wasn't yet decided finally," Peres said. Though the former prime minister said he thinks excluding Palestinian laborers is a bad idea, he conceded, "We cannot build a Gazan economy upon people coming to work in Israel."

Before the Palestinian uprising began, 150,000 Palestinians worked inside Israel, according to the United Nations Office of Humanitarian Affairs in Jerusalem.

In response to the violence, Israel introduced security barriers and travel restrictions, and the workforce has been reduced to 30,000. The United Nations says Palestinian unemployment rose from 10 percent in September 2000 to 40 percent now. Joblessness is even higher in Gaza, at 68 percent.

A World Bank report in October said that without steps to improve the climate for private investors, "there is no prospect of a sustained recovery of the Palestinian economy."

"Employment is the best answer to violence," Peres said. He arrives in Washington today to meet with Palestinian, European and U.S. officials to discuss the "privatization of peace." He's looking for buyers for 1,000 acres of settlement greenhouses, which he says could provide 20,000 jobs to Palestinians.

Peres hopes to create industrial zones in the Palestinian territories modeled after successful ventures in Jordan and Egypt. He says European and U.S. companies expressed interest. Among them: computer makers Hewlett-Packard, Cisco Systems and Applied Materials.

Contributing: Barbara Slavi

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