Great Divide Between Rich, Poor in Palestine

By Kaoru Saishu

I recently met a man of 25, a high school teacher. He told me he had not been fully paid in nearly two years. He is being paid something, but there is always a delay. We went to the bank together. He was overjoyed that the check did not bounce. (I did not ask how much.)

He survives by living with his father and other family members. But this is not some cramped housing situation. Many Palestinian homes are well built and spacious. The older ones are especially well constructed from stones, making the dwelling cool and pleasant in the summer. I have seen houses and apartments that I would be thrilled to move into.

Maybe that is why the aforementioned residential area was appropriated: to accommodate the Jewish immigrants to Palestine.

Don’t kid yourself. Some people are living the high life in Palestine. Designer showrooms provide custommade furniture for their Israeli clientele.There are plenty of other vendors to provide the latest lighting and flooring. At the furniture show room, tables were constructed from heavy wood, not those cheapie reconstructed particle board pieces glued with toxic toluene.

However, the wares of Arab vendors cannot be exported without passing through Israel and the checkpoints. Therefore, their client base is quite restricted.

Food in Palestine is good and fresh and basically organic. People pay a fortune to obtain good quality olive oil and fruits like figs, fresh almonds and so forth. These items used to be grown almost exclusively (and abundantly) by the native Arab population.

A man I met at market told me that the reason Islam is being targeted in the world today is due to its financial system, which prohibits usury.Another told me that the idea of a bank along the lines of the Western concept is an anomaly (even an abomination) for the Islamic religion.

In Islamic nations, people use five-year loans when buying a house or an apartment etc. The loan is negotiated directly with the owner.

Only five years: Compare that to America’s 30-year bank loans with interest, meaning a lifetime of economic bondage and debt slavery.