What's behind Israel's biggest economic boom? The occupation
This week, Dr. Karnit Flug became the first woman in Israeli history to be appointed Governor of the Israel Central Bank – a position analogous to the U.S. Federal Reserve chair. The process leading up to her appointment played out as a satirical mirror-image to what had transpired in America a short while earlier.
In both cases, the outgoing chair/governor had strongly recommended his second-in-command, a woman, as successor. In both cases, the government had originally skipped over the female candidate, instead courting has-been male candidates with skeletons in their closets. And in both cases, common sense eventually prevailed.
There were, however, the familiar differences between the American process and its Israeli doppleganger, in the depth of the farce. Whereas the Obama administration had only considered Larry Summers over Janet Yellen, but never formally extended the invitation – the Netanyahu government managed to formally appoint not one, but two would-be male governors, only to see both candidacies evaporate into thin air. Then, Bibi and his finance minister, Lapid, bickered and vacillated over various other candidates for an additional three to four months before finally reverting to Flug – who was meanwhile the acting governor – as the option of last resort. This was preceded by Lapid – a few months ago Israel’s rising political star and nowadays its favorite laughingstock – going on national TV a mere four days before the final appointment and stating in his signature dismissive overconfidence that, “Flug will never be Bank of Israel governor.”
more...... the reason?.... She wrote the report on Israel's economic growth which put the occupation as a main Raison d'être. The rest of the article goes into historical details andl depth and I thought as socialists we should look at the economics of the situation.
I didn't know that about Larry Summers which was an eye opener.
The author of the article
Dr. Assaf Oron is an expatriate Israeli living in Seattle since late 2002. He works as a research statistician at Seattle Children’s Hospital. Prior to arriving in Seattle, he was active in the Israeli anti-Occupation groups Ta’ayush and “Courage To Refuse.” He now supports the activities of the humanitarian organization Villages Group from afar
http://972mag.com/whats-behind-israels-biggest-economic-boom-the-occupation/81038/
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