After Jews leave, Arabs unable to successed in greenhouses

The Palestinians who took over the Jewish greenhouses in the Gaza Strip when Israel withdrew its communities from the area now are asking expelled farmers for advice after reportedly failing to reproduce the region's famous insect-free vegetables, WND has learned.

Prior to Israel's August withdrawal, the residents of Gaza's Gush Katif slate of Jewish communities ran greenhouses known for producing high-quality insect-free vegetables. The Gush Katif gardens featured some of the most technologically advanced agricultural equipment and accounted for more than $100 million per year in exports to Europe. The greenhouses also supplied Israel with 75 percent of its own produce.

The hothouses were passed to the Palestinians in September in a $14 million deal brokered by former World Bank President James Wolfenson and several wealthy Jewish Americans.

Earlier this month, the Palestinians now running the greenhouses reportedly told the Israeli-Palestinian Economic Cooperation Fund they failed in their efforts to grow bug-free produce.

Now the Palestinian owners have asked the United States Agency for International Development, which has been involved in reconstruction efforts in Gaza, to hire former Jewish Gaza greenhouse owners as consultants for their declining vegetable businesses.

The Arab world not just the Palestinians has squandered its great wealth trying to destroy Israel rather than develop a vibrant economy that could be independent of oil. Israel on the other hand has in the face of this threat has made the desert bloom. Why anyone living in the lands bordering Israel and analyzing the contrast could not wonder. The common excuse that they are held back by the Zionist occupiers has to look shallow in retrospect to the greenhouse issue.

I've been hearing the term refugee camp used to describe Palestinian settlements for 30 years, and I know the term existed before I came along. What confused me though was the pictures shown of these camps looked like cities with buildings, houses, roads and utilities. The term betrayed a propaganda campaign which has held back Palestinian society from meaningful development.

Now the Jews have left developed agricultural industry and the Palestinians have nowhere to go but to Israel for help. Not the Saudis, Syrians, Iranians, or Egyptians have the know-how to help. All the oil in the world can't make a nation prosper who gives its energy to destroying its neighbors.

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