The economic life of Gaza
Business Daily
BBC
4.4 • 816 Ratings
🗓️ 21 June 2021
⏱️ 18 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Israel's military says it struck a thousand targets in Gaza last month, in response to more than 4,300 missiles it claims were fired into Israel. With the latest bout of violence now over, the reconstruction can begin once again.
Manuela Saragosa speaks to Samir Mansour, who saw his famous Gaza bookshop destroyed before his eyes. International donors want to help rebuild businesses like Samir's. Elizabeth Campbell, director at the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, describes how this can be done without also enabling the Hamas government, which is labelled a terrorist group by the US, EU and Israel.
Israel and Egypt maintain a blockade on Gaza that has rendered commerce with the outside world almost impossible. But could the economy have great potential, were the blockade ever lifted? Asmaa AbuMezied of Oxfam points to Gaza’s fledgling startup scene, while Manal White of the social enterprise Zaytoun in London highlights the opportunity for Gazan agricultural exports.
Producer: Frey Lindsay
(Picture: Samir Mansour stands before the remains of his bookstore in Gaza; Credit: Marcus Yam/Los Angeles Times/Getty Images)
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hello and welcome to Business Daily from the BBC with me, Manuel Saragossa. |
| 0:06.7 | Coming up, the economic life of Gaza. |
| 0:09.9 | We would love to trade with Gaza, but it hasn't been possible since 2006. |
| 0:14.6 | Basically, Gaza is sealed off by land, sea and air. |
| 0:17.6 | But we're asking, what's the potential of Gaza's economy? |
| 0:20.7 | We're talking about a very |
| 0:22.8 | entrepreneurial group of people who've obtained high levels of education. That's all here in |
| 0:29.1 | Business Daily from the BBC. The customers who came here were from all backgrounds. |
| 0:42.9 | Children, students, writers, novelists, and even university professors would come to us. |
| 0:52.2 | Samir there used to run a bookshop in the Gaza Strip, |
| 0:55.7 | the Samir Mansour Bookshop for printing, publishing and distribution. |
| 1:00.1 | It was a cultural meeting point in the territory. |
| 1:02.6 | Then, on an early morning in May this year, |
| 1:05.0 | at the height of the hostilities between Hamas and Israel, |
| 1:08.3 | Samir was watching the news and saw that the area his bookshop is in |
| 1:11.9 | was about to be hit by an Israeli air strike. |
| 1:17.2 | As soon as I saw it on the news, I immediately ran out before the final rocket. |
| 1:23.6 | There is a preliminary missile to warn and then want to destroy. |
| 1:28.2 | Within seven minutes, I was in front of the building. |
| 1:31.9 | It was not destroyed yet. |
| 1:33.7 | Then they fired the missile and I saw the building collapse. |
| 1:41.2 | I felt that my soul was leaving my body as I watched the bookshop being destroyed. |
... |
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