TULKAREM, West Bank (AP) — Hanadi Abu Zant has been unable to pay rent on her apartment in the occupied West Bank for almost a year after losing her permit to work inside Israel. When her landlord calls the police, she hides in a mosque.

“My biggest fear is being kicked out of my home. Where will we sleep, on the street?” she said, wiping tears from her cheeks.

She is one of the approximately 100,000 Palestinians whose work permits were revoked after the Hamas attack on October 7, 2023, which sparked the war in the Gaza Strip. Confined to the occupied territory, where jobs are scarce and wages much lower, they face increasingly limited and dangerous options as the economic crisis worsens.

Some have sold their belongings or gone into debt in an attempt to pay for food, electricity and school fees for their children. Others have paid high fees for black market permits or have attempted to enter Israel clandestinely, risking arrest or worse if they are mistaken for militiamen.

Israel, which has controlled the West Bank for nearly six decades, says it has no obligation to allow Palestinians in to work and makes those decisions based on security considerations. Thousands of Palestinians are still allowed to work in dozens of Jewish settlements in the West Bank, built on land they claim for a future state.

Risk of collapse

The World Bank has warned that the West Bank economy is at risk of collapse due to Israeli restrictions. By the end of last year, unemployment had risen to nearly 30% compared to about 12% before the war, according to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics.

Before the war, tens of thousands of Palestinians worked inside Israel, mainly in construction and service jobs. Salaries can be more than double those in the West Bank, a landlocked territory where decades of Israeli roadblocks, land confiscations and other restrictions have severely affected the economy. Palestinians also blame the Palestinian Authority, which exercises limited self-government in parts of the territory, for not doing enough to create jobs.

Around 100,000 Palestinians had work permits that were revoked after the outbreak of war. Since then, Israel has resettled fewer than 10,000, according to Gisha, an Israeli group that advocates for Palestinian freedom of movement.

Wages earned in Israel injected around $4 billion into the Palestinian economy in 2022, according to the Institute for National Security Studies, an Israeli think tank. That amounts to about two-thirds of the Palestinian Authority's budget that year.

An Israeli official said Palestinians have no inherent right to enter Israel, and that permits are subject to security considerations. The official spoke on condition of anonymity in accordance with regulations.

Israel seized the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem in the 1967 Six-Day War, territories that Palestinians want for a future state. Around three million Palestinians live in the West Bank, along with more than 500,000 Israeli settlers who can enter and leave freely.

The war in Gaza has led to an increase in Palestinian attacks against Israelis, as well as settler violence. Military operations that Israel says are aimed at dismantling armed groups have caused serious damage in the West Bank and displaced tens of thousands of Palestinians.

“My refrigerator is empty”

After her husband left her five years ago, Abu Zant got a job at a food packaging plant in Israel that paid about $1,400 a month, enough to support her four children. When the war broke out, he thought the ban would only last a few months. She baked cakes for friends to get by.

Hasan Joma, who ran a business in Tulkarem before the war helping people find work in Israel, said Palestinian brokers are charging more than triple the price for a permit.

Although there are no definitive figures, tens of thousands of Palestinians are believed to be working illegally in Israel, according to Esteban Klor, an economics professor at the Hebrew University of Israel and a senior researcher at the INSS. Some risk their lives trying to cross Israel's separation barrier, which consists of nine-meter-high concrete walls, fences and closed military roads.

Shuhrat Barghouthi said her husband has spent five months in prison for trying to scale the barrier to enter Israel to work. Before the war, the couple worked in Israel earning a total of $5,700 a month. Now they are both unemployed and have a debt of around $14,000.

“Come look at my refrigerator, it's empty, there's nothing to feed my children,” she said. He can't afford to heat his apartment, where he hasn't paid rent in two years. She says her children often get sick and often go to bed hungry.

She sometimes returns home to see her belongings scattered in the street by her landlord, who has been trying to evict them.

Forced to work in settlements

Of the approximately 48,000 Palestinians who worked in Israeli settlements before the war, more than 65% have kept their permits, according to Gisha. Palestinians and most of the international community consider the settlements, which have expanded rapidly in recent years, to be illegal.

Israeli officials did not respond to questions about why more Palestinians are being allowed to work in the settlements.

Palestinians employed in the settlements, who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals, said their employers have beefed up security since the start of the war and are much more willing to fire anyone who steps out of line, knowing that there are many more desperate for work.

Two Palestinians who work in the Mishor Adumim settlement said security guards check workers' phones and arbitrarily revoke their permits.

Israelis have turned to foreign workers to fill jobs held by Palestinians, but some say it is a poor substitution because they cost more and don't know the language. Palestinians speak Arabic, but those who work in Israel often speak fluent Hebrew.

Raphael Dadush, an Israeli developer, said the crackdown on permitting has led to costly delays.

Before the war, Palestinians made up more than half of its workforce. He has tried replacing them with Chinese workers, but says it is not exactly the same. He understands the government's decision, but says it is time to find a way for Palestinians to return that guarantees Israel's security.

Assaf Adiv, executive director of an Israeli group that advocates for Palestinian labor rights, says there has to be some economic integration or there will be “chaos.”

“The alternative to working in Israel is hunger and desperation,” he said.

___

This story was translated from English by an editor. of AP with the help of a generative artificial intelligence tool.