Will Palestine get its own currency?
Two decades after the Oslo Accord, and after the issuance of Palestinian passports and the raising of the Palestinian flag at the UN, Palestinians still await their own currency.
GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip — Twenty-two years have passed since the Oslo Accord, or the so-called Declaration of Principles on Interim Self-Government Arrangements, was signed between the PLO and Israel in 1993. This accord led to the establishment of the Palestinian Authority (PA) and to the creation of a Palestinian political system with a president and ministers in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Palestinian passports were issued, and the Palestine Monetary Authority (PMA) was established to serve as a national central bank. Moreover the flag of Palestine was recently raised in the United Nations, on Oct. 13, but one thing has yet to be achieved: an independent Palestinian currency.
Nasr Abdel Karim, an economic analyst and lecturer at the Arab American University of Jenin, told Al-Monitor, “This has been impossible as a result of the Paris Economic Protocol, annexed to the Oslo Accord and governing economic relations. This protocol imposed an Israeli approval for the issuance of a Palestinian currency.”
