In recent months the role of international law and human rights has come under increasing scrutiny. This introspection has involved, among other things, questioning whether Palestinians should continue to bring their claims to Israeli civil and military courts; whether occupation law is a part of the problem or part of the solution; and, if legal claims are to be brought before international tribunals, what should they allege?

* Multiple attempts and policies to practically eliminate Palestinian farmers have been underway since the beginning of the establishment of the state of Israel in 1948.

* Today, Palestinian farmers face an additional threat: Land confiscation by the Palestinian Authority in order to build industrial zones with international sponsorship, claiming this will help farmers and create job opportunities.

* Reports have warned that industrial zones – a tool of the traditional top down neoliberal development approach that is revered by international financial institutions – will bring benefits for Israeli businesses while destroying farming families and the most fertile stretches of land in the Occupied Palestinian Territory.

* Palestinian civil society and non-governmental organizations have a special responsibility to act in defense of Palestinian farmers against the policies of both Israel and the “state” of Palestine.

• Public debt enables capitalists to pressure the Palestinian Authority to adjust its policies by favoring large private firms, who threaten to withdraw investments and hold back others.

• Palestinian capitalists have attempted to practice social control by recruiting civil society to serve their objectives, working alongside major international donors.

• Monopolies are selectively granted to Palestinian capitalists that enjoy special proximity to Israeli companies, who grant them privileges in return. The impact on the Palestinian economy is devastating.

• The political and social influences of Palestinian capitalists complicit in normalization projects are a structural obstacle to the anti-colonial struggle.

The World Bank growth report, Towards Economic Sustainability of a Future Palestinian State: Promoting Private Sector-Led Growth provides a breakdown of the current state of the Palestinian economy, the obstacles it faces, and the major weaknesses and structural distortions it suffers from. The recent report also provides policy recommendations for what it claims will lead to sustainable economic development based on an export-driven, private sector-led growth model.

The report’s frank conclusions on the current state of the Palestinian economy are largely unsurprising: fragile and dependent on foreign aid. The report bluntly states that this aid-based growth is unsustainable, especially because aid levels are expected to decline over time. The surprising part of the report lies not in the negative prognosis given to the Palestinian economy, but rather its recommendations. Indeed, it reveals a long-standing and disastrous failure on the part of the World Bank to take into account the actual conditions of occupation and the historical policies taken by the Government of Israel against Palestinians.

Lebanese activist, author, and agronomist Rami Zurayk joins Al-Shabaka Policy Advisors Samer Abdelnour and Alaa Tartir to tackle the way the agricultural sector has been devastated by Israeli policies as well as the Palestinian Authority (PA) and donor policies and practices -- in "Farming Palestine for Freedom.