THE war in the Palestinian territories is having a catastrophic impact on the local economy, the World Bank said Monday, noting that all sectors have been badly affected by Israel’s attacks.
Economic output in the Gaza Strip plummeted by 86 per cent in the first half of this year, and by 23 per cent in the West Bank, according to recent Bank data, leaving the Palestinian economy on track to contract by 26 per cent in inflation-adjusted terms this year.
“The ongoing conflict in the Middle East continues to have a catastrophic impact on the Palestinian economy, pushing the territories into a crisis of unprecedented magnitude,” the bank said in a statement.
“The continuation of the hostilities has led to a sharp reduction in economic output and a collapse of basic services in both the West Bank and Gaza, amid skyrocketing poverty across the territories,” it added.
The war in Gaza was sparked by Hamas’s 7 October 2023 attack on Israel that resulted in the deaths of 1,208 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally of Israeli official figures.
Since then, Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed at least 44,976 people in Gaza, a majority of them civilians, according to figures from the Hamas-run territory’s health ministry that the United Nations considers reliable.
AFP
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