Publication
Omar Shaban Ismail · PCPSR — Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research · 2021
A 2021 PCPSR strategic analysis of Gaza's five-year prospects (2021-2026). Shaban evaluates four scenarios — status quo continuation, limited economic relief, comprehensive ceasefire deal, and Palestinian reconciliation — and concludes that without a fundamental political change addressing the blockade, Gaza faces irreversible social and institutional collapse within the period.
A 2021 PCPSR strategic analysis of Gaza's five-year prospects (2021-2026). Shaban evaluates four scenarios — status quo continuation, limited economic…
Editorial summary — the full article is published by PCPSR — Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research and cannot be reproduced here. What follows is an account of the subject written afterwards, not the original text.
A strategic analysis of Gaza's prospects over the 2021-2026 period, produced for the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research. The analysis proceeds from a frank assessment of the conditions entering the period: a devastating war completed in May 2021 with no political resolution, a humanitarian crisis accelerating on every measurable indicator, and a political landscape offering no visible pathway to change.
The five-year horizon under examination is not merely a forecast exercise — it is an attempt to identify the conditions under which Gaza's trajectory could change direction, and the conditions under which it would not.
The baseline scenario — continuation of the status quo — is the most likely and the worst. Under this scenario, Gaza's population continues to grow while the economic base contracts. Unemployment remains above 50% for youth. The electricity supply remains below eight hours daily. Groundwater depletion continues to render more of the water supply undrinkable. Health infrastructure, overwhelmed after each war, cannot recover before the next escalation.
The fundamental driver of this baseline scenario is the absence of political change. The blockade is the primary economic constraint, and the blockade is a political instrument. Without a political process that addresses the blockade, economic deterioration is structurally predetermined.
The analysis identifies three plausible alternative scenarios. The first is limited economic relief without political resolution — some easing of import and export restrictions, increased energy supply, and expanded fishing zones. This would slow the deterioration without reversing it. The second is a comprehensive Gaza ceasefire agreement with an economic package — modeled on the 2014 ceasefire discussions — that provides a more substantial economic framework in exchange for a long-term security arrangement. The third, the most positive but least likely, is Palestinian reconciliation combined with a political process that begins to address the fundamental issues of sovereignty and statehood.
The five-year outlook concludes that without a fundamental political change — either addressing the blockade through an economic agreement or resolving the Palestinian political division — Gaza will reach a point of irreversible social and institutional collapse within the period under analysis.
Topic: Gaza Reconstruction — scenarios · Gaza Governance · reconstruction · Hamas · Palestinian Politics · five-year outlook — Text © PCPSR — Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research — archived here with attribution to the source. — Original source — PDF