THE ECONOMIST
The West Bank tires of its government
October 2, 2015

IT SEEMS that the ageing politicians who appear on the official Palestine television station are in “urgent need” of a makeover. So, at least, said one of the channel’s directors in a letter to Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president. He proposed hiring a make-up artist, a prestigious one who has “already worked with several international stations.” Her fee, though, was $12,000 per month—roughly what the average Palestinian will earn in four years…Asked to name the “most serious problem” in their society, 24% of Palestinians say it is corruption—only slightly below the 28% who point to the Israeli occupation. Four-fifths believe their leaders are corrupt. READ MORE

Talkbacks included: Congratulations to the Economist for bringing its readers attention to the corruption within the Palestinian Authority leadership. This same corruption plagues the leadership of Hamas in Gaza. The enemy of the Palestinians is not Israel but its own leadership. It has been useful for that leadership to blame Israel for all its woes in order to maintain power and control over its own people. One can only hope that the western donors to the PA will withhold support and demand accountability for the hundreds of millions of aid dollars that have gone missing and into the pockets of PA officials over the past twenty years.