(September 8, 2022): On Thursday, MIFTAH hosted a group of European Union and like-minded diplomats and our Board of Directors’ Chairperson Dr. Hanan Ashrawi, and Deputy Nour Odeh briefed them on latest Israeli crimes and human rights violations in relation to recent political developments.

Firstly, we expressed the Palestinian civil society's deep concern regarding the European Union’s revival of the EU-Israel Association Council and the new gas deal, which is rewarding Israel instead of ending its impunity and holding it accountable for persistent crimes. We also discussed the new "COGAT" Directive, another Israeli attempt at demographic engineering, which will further restrict the lives and movement of Palestinians and affect European nationals and exchange programs too. Also, we stressed that while Israel is crossing EU "red lines" by advancing the E1 illegal settlement bloc intended to suffocate occupied Jerusalem, and escalating its assault on Palestinian civil society, real accountability remains nowhere to be found.

Additionally, we also talked about the ongoing ethnic cleansing and forced displacement of Palestinians which continues unabated in Masafer Yatta and Jerusalem in the occupied West Bank among other areas. Similarly, we highlighted the need for intervention to end Israeli administrative detention, which holds Palestinians indefinitely without charge or trial, including Palestinian-French human rights defender Salah Hammouri. We also highlighted the collusion of the Israeli government and settlers that tie archeological and cultural sites to a Jewish-only narrative as a pretext to facilitate the theft of more Palestinian land and resources.

Finally, the speakers appreciated the active diplomatic missions that express solidarity through field visits and statements but called for this to be translated into a change in policy in their capitals to contribute effectively to bring justice and peace.

Ramallah – 1/9/2022 – MIFTAH recently launched the 2022 digital citizens’ budget in coordination with the budget and planning teams from various line ministries. The citizens’ budgets of six ministries were presented during the meeting. MIFTAH shared its experiences with partner ministries and biannual and annual actual spending reports for the various ministries were compared.

MIFTAH Executive Director, Dr. Tahreer Al Araj addressed advocacy and lobbying efforts in line with MIFTAH’s strategic approaches, to include standards of social justice in public fiscal policies. This, she said, requires citizens to be aware of their rights, which includes the publication of citizens’ budgets and government spending reports for various public institutions. Araj maintained that citizens’ reports help to identify several indicators pointing to social gaps and constitute a reference for how these gaps reflect on marginalized and vulnerable groups including the government’s bias towards them.

Furthermore, MIFTAH’s Democracy and Good Governance Program Director, Lamis Shuaibi-Hantouli addressed MIFTAH’s role and relationship with the various ministries in encouraging them to be more open in the publication of their fiscal statements. She also touched on the evolving relationship between civil society and the government and the impact of these fiscal policies at the level of budgets and public spending, in addition to development towards digitalization. She discussed the impact of these policies vis-à-vis good practices pertaining to international transparency, in addition to influencing executive policies in line with national reform strategies. In addition, Shuaibi-Hantouli spoke about MIFTAH’s support in providing a climate of dialogue between the relevant parties, based on evidence from accurate financial facts and figures, which she said comprised the basis for social accountability.

The e-platform for citizens’ budgets was then presented, which includes several social sector institutions and the general citizens’ budget. The platform reflects a transformation in how budgets are released. Their digitalization promotes more candidness among ministries about their services and how citizens can access data on public expenditures. The platform also includes interactive tools that allow its visitors to send in suggestions, complaints or objections regarding expenditures to the various public institutions.

The participants discussed the recommendations by the ministries’ budget and planning teams, which stressed on the importance of providing the platform with tools to simplify the ministries’ programs and budgets to the public and compare them to the actual spending of these institutions. The recommendations also said it was imperative to guarantee the platform’s sustainability and coordinate with ministries to regularly provide it with the necessary data, which first requires a Cabinet decision to adopt a citizens’ budget e-platform.

MIFTAH’s Dialogue Unit head, Hassan Mahareeq, said the launching of this budget was in line with MIFTAH’s strategic approaches to continue advocacy and lobbying efforts in order to guarantee social justice and equality in the development of public policies. He also said the organization sought the promotion of good governance in Palestine. To this end, Mahareeq explained that MIFTAH, in cooperation with UNDP, has worked on digitizing the citizens’ budget, in partnership with several ministries from the social sector, since the start of this year. He said the overall objective was the sustainability and development of international transparency standards for budgets and to promote more openness from government institutions towards the public, by regularly releasing financial statements pertaining to government spending allocations on social services programs. Another objective, he maintained was to improve citizens’ access to these services through this e-platform.

Ramallah – Civil society organizations, headed by MIFTAH, recently completed discussions on the Value Added Tax (VAT) bill with the Customs, Excise and VAT Department and the gender unit at the Ministry of Finance. The discussions are part of MIFTAH’s strategic course of action aimed at impacting public policies to guarantee citizens’ rights for all sectors of Palestinian society, to enhance the principles of good governance in official institutions and promote social justice in developing fiscal policies.

On behalf of CSOs, MIFTAH presented further comments to those previously presented on the most recent version of the VAT draft law, which included the following:

• Article 4, Paragraph 1, stipulates tax exemption for all non-profit organizations, yet Paragraph 2 of Article 4 stipulates: “The tax shall be imposed on non-profit organizations according to rates within the provisions of Article 2 of this law, to any activities that compete with the private sector.” This achieves the goal of the private sector in subjecting institutions to other taxes, on the premise that these are profitable activities, which compete with the private sector.

• A call to amend Article 2, by preparing a list that reflects tax progression rates on commodities and services, to promote fair distribution, particularly regarding VAT reduction on basic commodities and services; the list will be included as an addendum to the law.

• Articles in the penal code were pointed out, which lack principles of the rule of law towards the ‘employer”, demanding that its provisions abide by the provisions of the amended Palestinian Basic Law.

MIFTAH commented that while it appreciated the demands previously made, the abovementioned comments were key to promoting social justice in fiscal policies.

Meanwhile, representative for the Customs, Excise and VAT Department, Loay Hanash, said his department was open to discussions and cooperation with civil society to implement amendments to the articles in consultation with CSOs, maintaining that the following amendments were positively received:

• Amendment to Article 4, Paragraph 2 of the bill, which stipulates: Taxes shall be imposed on non-profit organizations according to tax rates within the provisions of Article 2 of this law, on any activities that infringe on the private sector.”

• An agreement that MIFTAH, in consultation with CSO’s, will prepare a list of commodities and VAT percentages towards achieving social justice, through progressive tax rates. The Ministry of Finance said it was prepared to adopt this within the framework of the law.

Within this context, MIFTAH stressed on fostering a dialogue-conducive environment with government and official parties as a foundation for influencing public policies and for adopting social justice as a basis for developing policies and influencing decision-makers in favor of citizens’ rights, which guarantee the protection of rights for marginalized and underprivileged social sectors.