Palestine: Norway To Help Transfer Tax Funds Frozen By Israel

Norway says it will help facilitate the transfer of tax revenues, collected by Israel and bound for the Palestinian Authority (PA), in order to prevent the financial collapse of the authority that partially governs the occupied West Bank.

“The Palestinian Authority will be able to pay salaries, thus making it possible to continue to provide essential services to the Palestinian population, keep schools open, and ensure that health workers are paid,” the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement on Sunday.

This is critical to promoting stability in the region and for the Palestinian Authority to have legitimacy among its people,” it added.

Israel collects tax on behalf of the Palestinians and makes monthly transfers to the PA under the Oslo accords in 1994, but in November it froze funds meant for Palestinians in Gaza.

The PA was expelled from the Gaza Strip in 2007, but it still pays the salaries of many of its public sector employees. Israel says the fund might fall into the hands of Hamas, which governs Gaza.

Tel Aviv, however, later agreed to transfer the tax revenues to the PA deducting the amount meant for Gaza. In response, the PA refused to accept a partial transfer saying it would not accept conditions that prevented it from paying its staff. It is estimated that some 30 percent of its budget is spent in Gaza.

Israel launched a devastating military offensive in Gaza in the wake of the Hamas-led, October 7 attack.

About 240 people were taken captives out of which more than 100 people were released as part of a brief truce in November.

As a dire economic crisis exacerbated across the occupied West Bank, the for Israeli cabinet approved in January a plan frozen tax funds earmarked for the Strip to be held by Norway instead of transferred to the PA.

ALJAZEERA