RIGHT STEPS
We've done so many things wrong in the Middle East of late, it makes it all the more important to recognize when we seem to be doing something that's the slightest bit right. Here's what I'm referring to from the New York Times:
"The Palestinian West Bank, besieged by Israeli occupation, political division and weak leadership, got a boost on Monday: the announcement of a plan, led by the American government, to help tens of thousands of people buy homes.
The plan, which establishes a $500 million mortgage company, aims to build 10 new neighborhoods over the next five years and, in the process, create thousands of jobs in construction and real estate. In doing so, it could improve the depressed local economy and the political prospects of the Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, of the relatively pro-West Fatah party..."
"The new company’s name, Affordable Mortgage and Loan Company, yields the acronym AMAL, an Arabic word meaning hope.
“We believe this gives the Palestinians of Gaza a reason to try to change the status quo,” said Mohammad A. Mustafa, chief executive of the Palestine Investment Fund, which runs the new program. “Something good could be in store for them besides their ongoing nightmare.”
Palestinian officials say that in the next decade, 470,000 new homes will be needed in the West Bank and Gaza, and that 75 percent of the population is without affordable housing. The new plan will make mortgages available for about 30,000 apartments.
Some 2.5 million Palestinians live in the West Bank, along with about 250,000 Israeli settlers. Israel also holds large parts of the area for security. An additional 1.5 million Palestinians live in the Gaza Strip, which Israel evacuated in the summer of 2005.
Half of the money for the new mortgage company, $250 million, will come from the United States through the Overseas Private Investment Corporation. The rest will be from the Palestine Investment Fund, the International Finance Corporation of the World Bank and the Bank of Palestine, with a smaller contribution from the British government."
It may be too little, too late, given the forces swirling around this perennial issue, but from where I sit, it seems like a very small step in the right direction.
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