The Israeli finance minister announced on Tuesday, June 10, the cancellation of a repeal that allows Israeli banks to work with Palestinian banks, which threatens to paralyze Palestinian financial institutions.
“In the context of the delegation campaign carried out by the Palestinian Authority against the State of Israel at the international level, Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich asked (…) to cancel the compensation granted to the banks that deal with banks that work in the territories of the Palestinian authority,” said the Office of the Minister of FAR -Right in a press release.
In May 2024, Bezalel Smotrich had already threatened to reduce this link, vital for Palestinian banks, in retaliation for the recognition of the state of Palestine by three European countries.
The Israeli national currency used in the West Bank
The Palestinian financial and banking system depends a lot on this renewal of Israeli repeal, which protects Israeli banks from possible legal procedures linked to transactions with their Palestinian counterparts, for example, in terms of terrorism financing.
The US Treasury secretary, Janet Yellen, had warned that cutting the Palestinian banks of their Israeli counterparts would run the risk of creating a humanitarian crisis.
The overwhelming majority of the West Bank are made in Shekels, the Israeli national currency, because the Palestinian authority does not have a central bank that allows it to print its own currency.
Source: BFM TV
