Until When Will the Palestinian Citizen Pay the Price of an Endless Phase?

Author: Khaled Deraghme

Until when will the Palestinian citizen pay the price of an endless phase?
The most difficult aspect of crises is not to experience them, but rather for them to turn into a permanent condition.
A crisis, by its nature, is assumed to be an exception—a temporary circumstance that puts pressure on people and the economy, then institutions begin to seek solutions, and policies shift to mitigate its effects, restoring a semblance of balance to life.
But what happens when the crisis doesn’t end?
When delayed salaries become a recurring possibility, price hikes a constant reality, fuel shortages a predictable news item, and declining job opportunities a part of daily life, where citizens are expected to understand the circumstances every time, endure the phase, and be more patient?
At that point, the problem is no longer just a singular crisis.
The issue is that the "phase" itself has become endless.
The citizen always picks up the tab
In economics, there are no crises without costs.
But the question is: who bears this cost? How is it distributed? Is it carried justly by society?
In our Palestinian reality, the citizen understands that the economy operates in a highly complex environment, with occupation, restrictions on movement, trade and resources, political division, and heavy reliance on external sources—all factors that impose real constraints on economic decision-making.
However, acknowledging this reality does not mean that every crisis becomes a perpetual justification for the absence of solutions.
The citizen pays when salaries are delayed.
They pay when prices rise.
They pay when fuel runs out.
They pay when services decline.
They pay when job opportunities shrink.
They pay when projects falter.
They even pay when the economy fails to provide the minimum capability for future planning.
Meanwhile, responsibility remains shared between external circumstances, the financial crisis, occupation, donor agencies, political developments, and global markets.
All of this is true.
But, in the end, the citizen does not pay part of the bill.
They pay it in full.
The problem is not just low income
Some may think that the economic problem boils down to the decline in citizen income.
But the reality is deeper than that.
The problem is that the citizen is no longer able to plan.
An economy that deprives people of their ability to plan loses one of the essential conditions for stability.
How can a young person plan to marry if they don’t know the value of their income in two months?
How can a family plan for their children's education if prices are rising faster than their ability to save?
How can a small business owner invest if they don’t know the cost of operations tomorrow?
How can an investor inject their money if the market itself is living on probabilities?
And when people cannot plan, the entire economy begins to retract.
The citizen postpones decisions. They reduce consumption. They stop investing. They prefer to hold on to what they have. The market gradually shifts from an economy seeking growth to one seeking survival.
At this point, the crisis is no longer just a financial issue.
It morphs into a crisis of trust.
Patience is not an economic policy
Patience has become part of public discourse.
Be patient with the crisis.
Be patient with salary delays.
Be patient with rising prices.
Be patient until conditions improve.
But no matter how necessary patience is, it cannot be a substitute for public policy.
It cannot turn into an economic plan.
The citizen can endure an exceptional circumstance, but they cannot build their entire life on waiting.
There is a difference between asking society to bear the cost of a temporary crisis and making the endurance of crises a permanent way of life.
There is a difference between telling people: this is a crisis, these are its causes, and this is our plan to get out of it, and asking them for patience without a clear timeline, measurable indicators, or an answer to the most critical question:
Where are we headed?
From crisis management to managing exit strategies
The real challenge today lies not only in addressing the current crisis but in preventing crises from becoming a permanent system.
This requires a change in economic thinking.
Crisis management means dealing with the problem after it has occurred.
In contrast, managing the exit from the crisis requires building predictive capabilities, developing scenarios, prioritizing, reordering expenditure, protecting the most vulnerable groups, enhancing local production, supporting sectors that can create job opportunities, and reducing reliance on unstable funding sources.
It also requires transparency with the citizen.
The citizen does not need reassuring data as much as they need clear information.
They want to know:
What is the scale of the problem?
What are its causes?
What options are available?
What is the cost?
Who bears it?
What is the expected timeline for resolution?
The truth may be hard, but it is less costly than uncertainty.
People can deal with a clearly defined crisis, but they collapse in the face of uncertainty.
The citizen is not a variable to be burdened
In every economic equation, there are limits to what can be imposed on any party.
The citizen is not an open box that can be returned to every time a financial gap appears.
It is illogical to ask them to pay more, bear more, consume less, and wait longer, while daily obligations accumulate without an expansion in earning capacity.
The citizen is more than just a consumer.
They are the worker producing, the employee paying, the merchant driving the market, the head of the household spending, and the small investor who can create job opportunities.
If their economic capacity is drained, the entire economy pays the price.
The question that can no longer be postponed
No one is asking for magic solutions.
No one expects a stable economy in such a harsh political and economic environment.
But what is demanded by the citizen is something more realistic:
To know the truth.
To see a plan.
To feel that the cost of the crisis is distributed fairly.
To realize that sacrifice is not a one-way street.
And to see that there is a genuine attempt to exit the cycle of crises, not just managing them daily.
The problem is not that the citizen is tired.
The problem is that they are tired of the crisis, then tired of waiting for its end, then from new crises that begin before they recover from the previous one.
And in the end, the permanent answer to every question cannot be:
"This is a phase, be patient."
Because the phase that never ends becomes a reality.
And a reality that does not change becomes a system.
And a system that makes the citizen always pay the price needs a serious review.
Therefore, the question is no longer:
Can the citizen endure?
They have proven they can.
The question is:
Until when will the citizen be required to pay the price of an endless phase, while no one knows when the phase of exiting it will begin?