BICOM

Israel’s Defence Minister has described the looming electricity crisis in Gaza as “an artificial Palestinian crisis”, but said Israel is ready to build and create jobs in Gaza if Hamas demilitarises.

In an article published in Arabic on the Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT) website, a useful channel for security officials to send messages to the Gaza population, Avigdor Lieberman said that Israel was willing to supply electricity to the Strip, “but they must pay first”.

On Sunday Israel’s security cabinet voted unanimously to grant a request from the Palestinian Authority (PA) Chairman Mahmoud Abbas to reduce the supply of electricity to the Gaza Strip. The request was part of escalating tensions between Abbas’s Fatah faction and Hamas who govern the Gaza Strip.

Lieberman accused Hamas of being responsible for the crisis. He said it is important to emphasise that of the £22.2m Hamas earns in taxes every month, “instead of going to education, improving the health system and improving water infrastructure … [it] goes to terror infrastructure, tunnels and rockets”.

He added: “Hamas is trying to divert the anger. It is trying to get rid of its failures and direct them at Israel. The opposite is true. Israel is ready to build industrial areas, to create jobs, to be a partner in construction of desalination plants and electrical plants—but the basic condition is demilitarisation.”

Lieberman also criticised Hamas’s leadership and governing ability over the past decade. He said the “shortage of electricity and poor sanitary conditions … is a low point never before seen in Gaza”, and called on Gaza residents  “to look at the situation in the West Bank and compare the living conditions there with those in Gaza”.