SOON THE GAZA STRIP WILL BE COMPETING WITH SINGAPORE - 21-Mar-95

(Commentary by Gad Lior, "Yediot Ahronot", Mar 21, 1995, p.B1,2)

This sounds like a city one dreams about: dozens of glass and stone buildings, surrounded by rings of green lawns, well-groomed hedges and fruit trees.

Between the expansive buildings, which will be built in a modern architectural style, there will be wide parking lots. In the center, a large building will be prominent it will have a bank, a post office, a restaurant, a cafe, performance and convention hall, and a mosque near it. There will be no chimneys, and no smoke. Everything is green and blooming. Even noise from the engines of the machines which will operate in the buildings will barely be heard.

This description is not fictitious. This is one of the industrial parks which the leadership of the Foreign, Industry and Finance Ministries is planning at this very moment, under total secrecy. The goal: to establish between 8 to 11 such parks on the cease-fire line between Israel and the autonomous areas, which the Palestinian Authority will control within the next few months.

Foreign Minister Shimon Peres is the one who envisioned all this, and those close to him say with pride: We are getting closer to Singapore, Taiwan and Hong-Kong, in huge steps.

And then, after the vision arrives to develop the cities Gaza, Dir Al- Balah, Ofakim and Sderot it will be copied in the cease-fire line between Afula and Jenin, to Mt. Hebron and Tul-Karm, and will reach the entrance of Kochav Yair.

Each industrial park will be established for about 10,000 employees, and will sit on 2,000 dunam of land, with considerable financial assistance from foreign investors and also governmental subsidies. The Palestinians will run them, and be its workers, for the most part.

Workers from Gaza, Hebron and Jenin will no longer need to leave in the early morning hours to reach Tel Aviv, Netanya or Hadera. The building in which they will work will be on the Green Line only a few minutes drive from their homes. And this will be the same at the end of the work day: some of the workers will not be forced, as happens today, to look for a wretched storage room or abandoned roof to sleep the night within the borders of Israel.

The advantages to Israel are also quite clear: no longer will tens of thousands of workers from the territories make their way into the depths of the State of Israel. The chances that attacks will be carried out will decrease, the amount of traffic on the access roads from the Strip and Judea and Samaria into the heart of Israel will decrease considerably.

Our ministers are already selling this idea to foreign investors. Foreign Minister Shimon Peres, Industry and Trade Minister Micha Harish and Finance Minister Avraham Shohat are trying to tempt investors from the U.S., Europe and the Far East.

Yossi Shohat, Head of Autonomy Affairs in the Industry and Trade Ministry: "The first assumption in establishing the parks is that we are assisting the Palestinians, and no doubt, the international community will accept this gladly. The foundation will be Israeli, arranging its establishment will be ours, but its actual establishment can be carried out by the thousands of unemployed workers in the territories."

Yediot Ahronot has learned that among the goals are attracting giant companies like Reebok and Nike, some of the most well-known producers of shoes in the world. The Israelis are planning to explain to them simply that: Why are you building plants in Korea, Malaysia and Thailand, which are so far away from your European markets?

"In Israel," Yossi Shohat explains, "these company's owners would be able to find incredible efficiency. The Jewish mind will develop concepts for them, and they will be able to take advantage of the opportunity to get cheap labor from workers in the territories."

A senior official in the Foreign Ministry explains: "With the help of such parks, we will be able to really compete with Thailand, Korea, Taiwan, Hong-Kong, Singapore, the Phillipines, Malaysia and Indonesia, which are the powers which stand out in the Far East. They have the advantage of speed, efficiency and cheap labor. We will have all of these as well as a geographical proximity to Europe. In addition, we have preferred trade agreements with the U.S. and with the Europe Community. There is no country in the world which can offer such conditions."

The intention is to establish three to five industrial parks on the cease- fire line in the Gaza Strip quickly. As to where exactly they are to be built there is a dispute: At the same time that the Foreign and Finance Ministries want to build the parks on the Palestinian side of the line, the Ministry of Industry and Trade prefers building the parks within Israel. The Environment Ministry has also intervened and has requested that the parks not be built on areas which are hydrologically sensitive. "The establishment of parks is likely to endanger both Israel's and the Autonomy's water sources," says Dr. Israel Peleg, director-general of the Environment Ministry, "and the costs involved in economic development will be our environmental loss in the end."

Where, in fact, are the parks planned to be?

* A park on the Tenth lane, across from Beit Lahaya, north of the Strip and south of Yad Mordechai. Two parks in Nahal Oz (North Park and South Park), right across from the hub of activity in Gaza city. A park at Kisufim, across from Dir Al-Balah and Netzer Hazani which is in northern Gush Katif. A park at Sufa, across from Rafiah, Khan Yunis and south of Gush Katif.

* There are also a number of plans to build parks in Judea and Samaria where the Civil Administration in Judea and Samaria is proposing to establish six industrial parks: In Jenin, Bethlehem, Hebron, Ramallah, Nablus, and TulKarm. The Civil Administration supports building parks deep within the Autonomy area, which would provide immediate work for the large, densely populated Arab centers and would prevent them from entering into Israel.

The as yet incomplete plans of both the Industry and Trade Ministry and the Foreign Ministry speak of 5-6 industrial parks on the Green Line in Judea and Samaria similar to those which surround the Gaza Strip. Among the areas proposed: Beit She'an, the area between Jenin and Afula, Kalkilya, Modi'in and Mount Hebron.

A senior Industry and Trade Ministry official, currently involved in preparing the plan at an economic ministry in Jerusalem, explained: "We will push for labor-intensive industry. It's not a comfortable situation for us, but it may be that we will take not a few factories from the Far East so we will do it in complete silence..."

Another reason that the Finance Ministry prefers to create the parks within the Palestinian Authority is so as not to impose a heavy burden on the State budget (now being cut). The Foreign Ministry is also convinced that investors will come in droves, but only if it is clear that we are really helping the Palestinians and that we are establishing these parks mainly for them.

But the Industry and Trade Ministry challenges this view, and hopes to implement this idea within the Green Line. According to Yossi Shochat, "a serious investor will be very hesitant to invest in the Autonomy. Who knows what will happen to Arafat or whether Hamas will behave? Will there be quiet in the territories? Investors will want political and economic insurance, which they will only get from an existing, flourishing state like Israel."