For Arabs, ‘Uprising’ Takes an Economic Toll

By ALAN COWELL, Special to The New York Times

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BETHLEHEM, Israeli-Occupied West Bank, March 13 — The Palestinian police officer rose this morning, packed his dark blue Israeli uniform in a plastic bag, went to his precinct next to the Church of the Nativity here and resigned.

That fulfillment of his political duty, as he saw it, left open the question of how he and his wife and their five children would eat after he spent his final paycheck, the equivalent of $500. “God will protect us.” the policeman. who gave his name as Rames, told a reporter. His relatives had offered a little help, too, he acknowledged.

Growing Economic Strain The decision of the 33-year-old officer, on a blustery Sunday in which rain alternated with sunshine around Bethlehem’s white stone churches, was part of the mass walkout this weekend by roughly half the 1,000 Palestinians employed by the Israeli Government as police officers in the occupied territories.

The resignations had been demanded by the clandestine leadership of the three-month-old uprising in the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip. The police resignations seemed to add to the growing economic strain that the uprising imposes on Palestinians.

The strikes, riots, curfews and boycotts ordered by the uprising’s underground leadership have separated Palestinians from jobs in Israel and within the occupied territories. The Palestinians are also affected by what they increasingly see as Israeli efforts to starve out the insurrection.

“I believe there is a new policy of Israeli economic squeeze,” said a Palestinian Mayor, Elias Freij of Bethlehem, commenting on reports today that the occupation forces had ordered a halt to sending gasoline and other fuel to the occupied territories for a week. “I know of people who are having hard times,” Mayor Freij said.

“But that is not going to weaken the uprising.” He echoed what seems to be a refrain by Palestinians interviewed on the West Bank today that few feel they have an alternative. The police officer who called himself

How this transcription was made

Transcribed from the slide scan by a reader working off magnified crops, not by optical character recognition. The newspaper is printed on the clipping, in the credit line “Special to The New York Times” under the byline; the photograph is credited to the Associated Press. There is no masthead, no folio and no printed year. The day and month come from the printed dateline, “BETHLEHEM, Israeli-Occupied West Bank, March 13”, and the text names the weekday, “on a blustery Sunday” — 13 March 1988 was a Sunday; the year is corroborated by the article’s description of the uprising as three months old. Two printed errors are kept as set, both in one sentence: “‘God will protect us.’ the policeman. who gave his name as Rames, told a reporter.” The paper twice signals that it does not vouch for that name, calling him later “The police officer who called himself”.

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"For Arabs, ‘Uprising’ Takes an Economic Toll," The New York Times, 14 March 1988. Covering Palestine archive, CP-1988-111. https://coveringpalestine.org/archive/cp-1988-111