Palestine Monetary Authority records digital currency | Business and Financial Issues

The Palestine Monetary Authority is considering digital donations, in a way that will give them more independence from Israel.

The Palestinian Monetary Authority is studying the potential for digital funding, an idea that could allow it to undermine its independence from Israel.

Under their agreement between 1990 and Israel, the Palestinians agreed not only to make their own money, and their wealth used the Israeli shekel, along with the Jordanian dinar and the US dollar.

Palestinian banks currently have a lot of weight because of Israel’s anti-money laundering policy, which means spending money fraudulently. Israel also reduces the amount of small Palestinian shekels that can return to Israel each month. As a result, they sometimes have to borrow to pay foreign currency to others, and they have more Israeli money. This could be one reason why digital currency can be a boon to the Palestinian financial system.

Two studies on cryptocurrencies are underway and no idea has been made, but the hope is that we will eventually use digital currency “to pay for our country and hope that Israel and others will use real payments,” Palestinian Finance Minister Feras Milhem said. in an interview with Bloomberg Television.

It would be impossible, though.

Palestinian economy is inherently weak, severely hampered by Israel’s limited access to free movement of people and people. It depends on the donor’s income, as well as the income from Israel.

Raja Khalidi, director of the Palestine Economic Policy Research Institute, said “the economy will not allow Palestinian currency – digital or otherwise – to be a means of exchange.”

However, he added that the introduction of some kind of digital currency “could send a political impetus to show that money is coming from Israel.”

Palestinians are joining economic leaders from Sweden to China to explore the potential of the country’s digital currency because the shortage of documents and money threatens to change payment systems. The availability of cryptocurrensets such as Bitcoin has increased the pressure on central banks to ensure that they have a viable option before receiving payment.

Barry Topf, a former adviser to the ambassador of the Bank of Israel, acknowledged that it was unlikely that Palestinian digital currency could be a real means of exchange. “It does not replace a shekel or a denarius or a dollar. There will be no barn or accounting compartment. ”

Much of the wealth has left Palestinian private institutions struggling financially, right away, and the European Investment Bank has pledged $ 425 million in loans that Milhem wants to lend to small and medium-sized businesses in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Concerned that the money could end up in the hands of the Gaza regime Hamas, which is considered to be a US-Israeli terrorist group, Milhem said all the money would be distributed by PMA-controlled banks.

“Our banks follow very strict rules,” he said. “They apply the rules of ‘knowing your client’. In this case, we do not worry. ”

-I assisted by Alisa Odenheimer and Fadwa Hodali.