Palestinian Finance Minister Omar Abdel-Razeq, has told the Palestinian parliament that he is proposing to cut thousands of government workers and selling off government investment assets in a bid to avert financial collapse.He said that Western aid cuts, Israel's refusal to release tax revenues, and U.S. pressure on banks to hold up the government's funds made it impossible for him to even submit a budget for next year.
Reuters reports that Hamas, which took control of the Palestinian Authority in March, has been unable to secure the funds to pay salaries to 165,000 government workers. Many services have stopped because of a lack of funds and because many employees can no longer afford the cost of transport to work.
