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just when israel's economic crisis is rid off that it can't get any worse, it does. the israel regime has conducted a large-scale onslot in the west bank, erasing any hopes for businesses to survive. this is while israels continue to leave the occupied palestine. meanwhile, the war cost keeps increasing due to israel's multiple war scenarios. hi, i'm khatway, welcome to economic divide. some of the highlights of today's programs: israel warfronts: iran is one of them, hizbullah is another, and we're also looking at the gaza strip and the wis banked to name few. then the crisis in the west bank. it is said to be a gaza style onslot that the regime wants to execute there. businesses are going to suffer as a result of that, and will continue to lose money, and the lack of workers also does not.

help any of this situation, then you're looking at israelies who are leaving the occupied lands, migration has increased, the most who do leave do not intend to return, and many are saying that israelis are just fed up with politics. "the israeli economy is showing signs of faster downward spiral that was not imagined before. the spectra of the genocidal war against palestinians reaching the occupied west bank has now become a reality. israeli regime forces have conducted the biggest raid and onslot on the occupied west bank, the largest in 22 years. this is severely of impacted israely businesses even further who are already suffering from economic crisis of of unprecedented magnitude. over 40,00 businesses have been..." since the

operational flood from october 7th, 2023. meanwhile the resistance groups in the occupied west bank are fighting back against the iof, which could signal a protracted conflict there, not that one was not occurring there already. the institute for national security studies in israel has revealed that israel now stands at a crossroads. the ongoing onslot on gaza and confrontations with the axes of resistance, detailing that every decision about the future will und doubtedly have significant economic consequences, especially considering that the projected budget deficit for 2024 is expected to exceed the forecast, underlying the current state budget significantly. the paper explores the economic impacts with three scenarios: continuing the war in gaza, escalating tensions on the northern front, we're securing an agreement that... includes

captive release deal, time for some social media post, first up, israel's economy is dying, construction, tourism, companies planning businesses with israel have backed out of billion dollar deals, countries like turkey have stopped exporting goods like lumber for construction, it's only going to get worse for them, then israel's power grid, which is largely switched to natural gas still depends on coal to supply demand. the biggest supplier of coal to israel is colombia, which announced that it would suspend coal shipments to israel. after colombia, the next two biggest suppliers are south africa and russia, without continuous and reliable electricity, israel will no longer... be able to pretend to be developed economy, then israel's economy is collapsing due to their own actions, tourism stopped, investments collapsed and the workers employees are fighting in the iof, we call the iof. germany has stopped sending money to israel because of the bds movements. and

finally, economic collapse up to 60,00 israeli businesses to close in 2024. the israel based information company predicts that up to 60,00 businesses will be forced to close down into. 2024, 46,00 businesses have already closed since october the 7th. israel's economy is buckling after almost a year of genocide of slaughter in gaza with hamas still not defeated. added pressure from hisbollah's strikes, making northern israel a ghost town. iran's looming retaliation for the assassination of ismahana and yemen's attacks on israeli linked shipping in the red sea has been a recipe for disaster for the israeli economy. all right, those were the posts that we picked. let me introduce our guests first up. of costas, former deputy minister of national defense and mp of greece, it's also deputy general secretary of international association of friends of crimea. all right, custas, welcome to economic divide, taking a look at the gaza war at this point, it's really the on stot

has impacted israel's economy to the point of almost no return based on what some people have said, and taking a look at what what we are looking at at this point, $60 billion dollars in spent. and then you have other war fronts like withbullah um and others, what kind of economic future do you for see for israel? thank you for your question, i think your question is very very relevant to today's israeleli social and economic crisis, because we must take into account that israeli economy is a war economy, it is a country that has been waging wars constantly. not classical wars in the classic sense of course, but in my opinion of course state terrorism. in any case, the forecasts for israeli economy are very, very dim, not only to israeli economists and the society within

israel, but also to man many international analysts, economic analysts around the world, the israely economy is expected to shrink. uh even further this year, perhaps more than two or three percent uh since the starting of the uh invasion in gaza and the continuation of the slaughter and the genocide in the west bank uh which has been, unfortunately the west bank is is becoming even more and more cloned in the way israel is waging war as in gaza today, so the workforce first of all in israel is missing from the labor markets, the statistic is showing that we have a 17% jump following the middle of october, and this is according to the taob center, which is an israeli economic think tank, i'm not posting my opinions, which may be even harsher, but

i'm trying to point out that the grim reality the economy of israel has to do that 20% of the israeli workforce or... perhaps 900 thousand israelis are now enlisted in the israeli army. um, tell us a little bit more about this workforce numbers, because the unemployment figures actually don't match the business closures. what's the story behind that? um, there is much unemployment which has been created because of this workforce being translated to uh the army, which is almost a million, and then at the same time we have hundreds and hundreds of thousands of israeli's. citizens fleeing israel, seeking visas around the world in the russian in in the russian continent, the eurasian continent, in europe and north america and so on, so the drastic cost of the war according

to the economic um situation is that there is no more growth in the israely economy, there will be a shortage and there is also already a shortage of many many goods, in in everyday israeli needs for israeli families and secondly there will be a shortage of fuel and energy because of the red sea continuation. the defense of the palestinian people uh by the houtis and yemen of course, so we must take into account that there is an enclosure the israeli economy from within and from the perimeter, which has to do with the workforce, the continuation of israeli citizens fleeing israel, plus the sortage of many many goods including energy and fuel. all right, let's bring in our next guest. john lucas moron joins us, he's a foreign desk editor of the irish uh press and senior

sub editor in the features departments of the irish times and co-curator of a highly successful exhibition of the irish orientalist writer patrick lafkadiahern john lucas welcome to economic divide um tell us what uh future this really economy is really facing here the spending is increasing and and with other war fronts you have more uh i guess funds. need to be um put into the war budget so to speak, and of course you're dealing with uh many business sectors that are just dying really. what kind of economic future do you for see for israel? the if if the if the war continues in gaza, if the genocide continues in gaza, there will be a massive impact on the israely economy, even if they don't go into war with iran. currently one of the one israeli economist

yacov shenin in the associated press has estimated the cost at about 120 billion or 20% of the gdp which is very high number indeed when you take top of that the amount of people that israel is losing to the... economy through people leaving the country in large numbers, through the expulsion of the palestinians who worked in the construction industry, to people been taken on for military duty, so that has meant that up to 6000 businesses have already closed, and as i say, there are so many now leaving the country, which has its own impact. time now

to take a look at some of the important news that we picked in our info news section. first up, it's a look at crypto in the us. well, it's said to be the capital, the crypto capital of the planet, actually. who said that? the former us president donald trump in a post on x, where he said, "i'm laying out my plan to ensure that the us will be the crypto capital of the planet." he said, they want to choke you. they want to choke you out of business. now trump said in the video that he put on x without specifying who they are, he added that we're not going to let that happen. hopefully we'll get an idea about what he's talking about. next, israel's budget, the topic of our program, this should obviously be something of huge worry for the israel regime. it has stalled its budget, actually substantive talks on the fiscal framework for the year 2025. have yet to begin, war costs are adding up, especially since new fronts have opened up, that should

be a big worry, because how can economy function when there's no budget planned? your guess is as good as mine. now we take a look at some tech layoffs that have happened, and this is pretty big news because they're continuing. big tech companies like apple like microsoft have fired hundreds of employees for the month of august and the tick and... industry is continuing to experience significant layoffs uh this year with major companies like apple, microsoft and google reducing their framework. now layoffs are driven by cost cutting on the one hand and then you have the ai focus and you also have the post-pandemic market adjustments and uh to give you an idea as of august more than 136,00 tech employees have lost their jobs in these layoffs and finally tariffs on china, yes that continues in this case and canada is following the us, it is imposed 100% tariff on the ev's electric

vehicles imported from china. ottawa to work with allies to ensure customers around the world are not unfairly penalized by non-market practices of countries such as china. that's what the prime minister of canada trudo has said. canada will also impose a 25% tarif on imported steel and aluminum from china. well, those were the news pieces that we picked for our news section of the program. if you have any uh pieces that you want to share with us uh from wherever you are, do uh send us your ideas, contact information is coming up. i don't win many awards in my own country so i'm a bit shocked. firstly like to thank the iranian people for uh welcoming welcoming me into your beautiful country. i want to tell

you uh all people in this room. storytellers, truth tellers, we cannot fake an emotion, we cannot fake the truth, this is for every child, mother and father who are lost by us made weapons and uk made weapons and european made weapons in our palestine, the second sob international media festival. time out for the end up section of the program, the economy in israel has been impacted by the gaza genocidal war for almost a year now, but the other war scenarios combined with the occupied west bank onslot now are dashing any hopes for any improvement really, it's hard to see how israel is going to crawl out of this one and uh forget about relying on this

uh guy over here, this is uh the finance minister of israel uh mr smok rich, israel is... not rely on him for anything, i mean take a look at this placard over here, for example, we all live in a sinking submarine, that's how israel's feel when it comes to their economics and their finances, well uh some negative indicators is what we're going to look at over here, no surprise here, investors for example, they've all but abandoned investing in the occupied territories most definitely to get worse because now you have the west bank onslide that's happening, then you have the credit downgrades that have happened and that puts israel really in a bind when it comes to loan prospects. "one of the sectors that has been hit hard is the israely tourism sector. the numbers speak for themselves uh, you take a look at how uh the number of tourists have dropped, well that's quite dramatic. then you take a look at the hotel occupency rate, which is one of the um things that gets impacted obviously due to the number of tourists dropping and and uh at this point minus 50% to 70% drop is what we're looking

at there. uh, we picked sector when it comes to lack of workers that we keep hearing about, and uh, we'" looking at the israeli health sector where they are dealing with shortages uh things like doctors in general and uh psychotherrapists and immigration in the sector is now uh pling it along with a shortage of funds which is always a bummer when it comes to uh any sector to thrive uh the cost of living in the occupied territories is another thing we uh have taken a look at and this point we are looking at oecd countries um the departure for example uh technicians with advanced technology outside the occupied lands is uh one sign of this um and we're also looking at uh the fact that uh when you have these types of uh figures to be higher uh in israel uh like consumer goods for example 50 to 70% more expensive in israel versus the average price levels in oecd member countries, well that just shows how bad things are for israelis

and of course that doesn't reflect well when it comes to uh the consumer confidence. um let's move to the next uh graph and see what we have over there uh this is the uh impact that the war has had and there's now number of fronts where there are wars involved uh obviously the deficit keeps going higher public spending uh as matter of fact in terms the funds available keeps getting lower at this point we're looking at uh the gdp loss of 14 uh billion dollars based on what we're seeing here so obviously that's not a good sign and finally uh here are the numbers when it comes to israel's leaving the occupied lands, at this point uh we are looking at uh what percentage uh moving abroad 28% uh that's almost a third, number that may rise dramatically because of the situation in the west bank um which is um many are hoping that it's not going to turn out to be as bad as the gaza strip or even close to it, and of

course you see the rest, this percentage over here is uh going to probably decrease and move to the ones that are going to move. abroad. all right, let's bring back our guests uh to get some idea behind what's happening here. rejoining us is costus, the former deputy minister of national defense and mp of greece. uh, welcome back to the program uh, when we take a look at what is happening here, it's not great when it comes to the immigration that and the migration, i should say, from israelis. what are your thoughts about that in terms of uh, what uh impact that's going to have at this point, like labor markets. also being impacted, you have different dynamics involved here, the labor market particular i like to ask you about with 160, palestiny workers not working, well thank you for. your question once again, i think that the workforce uh liability within israel has to do, as we said before because of the enforced movement of

israeli workers towards the army, but also because of the incredible stopping of migrants doing their own land and their own country of course of palestinian workers, which has it very, very hard. israel is trying to create a a new workforce, new workforce uh substituting the palestinian workers, mostly as you said, in construction, agriculture, small businesses and so on. all right, let's uh find out what uh john lucas thinks. john lucas, i'm going to go along with the same lines of how we're looking a shortage of workers, palestinian workers. however not being permitted to work and the're uh workers that are being replaced by some from india for example in sri lanka um i mean are we looking at uh perhaps a crisis

point uh when it comes to uprising from palestinians and since they're not being allowed to work sure there there is a distinct possibility of that and uh not only that i mean there are serious problems in the west bank it's not just gaza. 'there have been terrible attacks on palestinians by settlers in gaza leading to many many deaths and terrible situation for the palestinian families living in that area, so that's already major problem, and in fact my suspicion is that they israelis would enjoy if there were more unrest in the west bank so they could apply the same criteria'. that they're applying to gaza, which is kill anything that moves, so that's a major problem. all right, costus, let me go and ask

you about this uh particular migration, it's very important to look at that, israel's israel is leaving the occupied lands, how much of an impact does this have on israel's economy? well, first of all, israel is experiencing demographic ' shock because of its mergerous genocidal war that the leaders of israel are continuing - the figures of evacuation and immigration from israel, israeli citizens of the russian background, israeli citizens of european background, israeli citizens of north american or south american background are fleeing the country for one simple reason, they do not agree. with the aggression of israel and the genocidal war against the palestinians and second and perhaps most important for their own families, because their children will be recruited into this genocidal war and they do

not want their children to be victims of this genocide being conducted by the zionist regime. okay, i'm going to ask you the same question, um, if i may, when it comes to this, john lucas, the way that the... israelis are migrating out of israel along with the shortage of workers is surely to impact the israeli economy, how much of an impact will that have do you think? well that exodus is causing a massive problem for israel, and it's not just a problem of losing workers in key industries like high-tech, teaching and others, it's causing an effect in terms of the political situation. in in israel, the battle for the soul of israel is taking place between an extreme hard right,

and what was formally liberal left, but has gone to the right itself, but if if the extreme hard right wins that war, then it will continue to lose highly educated workers from the more liberal high-tech teaching and finance in... industries, so that's that's one of these unforeseen consequences that can happen, but none of none of the outcomes from this for israel are good in any sense. based on the current situation, the israely economy is expected to record only 1% gdp. growth in 2024, israel perceived as economically unstable, it has reduced the appeal of its risk assets for 2025, low growth is expected at around 1%. going high

budget deficits to fund security, potentially raising the debt to gdp ratio to 75% and negatively impacting israel's credit rating. regular year we are growing at the rate of 3.7%. which mean that if you want it in dollar terms we are going to lose this year in gdp 14 billion dollar, but it's only in gdp we are losing much more. in the scenario of escalation and significant infrastructure damage, the israely economy could contract by up to 10% of gdp in 2024. the nearly years long onslot on gaza has severely harmed the israely economy and has resulted in higher deficits, bad credit ratings and damaged

sector and continued public spending, financial costs of rebuilding, paying casualties and improving defensive systems have been significant. economists have predicted a $14 billion gdp loss this year, citing that we are losing much more. there even some like this general who have said that if israel continues this onslot might reach point of no return. it would be stubling and continue the war until i don't. then i think we will not recover. this is really on slot in the occupied west bank and surpass his sixth day, making is really unsure of their economic prospects since it is no longer the gaza strip that is

a... experiencing instability and violence, well mass protest against prime minister netanyahu are also threatening to break the very fabric of israel society, with mass capital flight, the israely economy remains in a coma. that does for this edition of economic dubai. thank you so much for being with us and for watching this episode. if you have any questions or comments or critiques, do send them to us, contact information is there. fromway and the entire team at economic divide is goodbye until the next program.

headlines at press tv, the world food programs that more than 2 million palestinians in gaza are in urgent need of food. school children are also deprived of education for second year. iran's ambassador in vienna says tehran is prepared to forge cooperation with the international atomic energy agency, whose head is said to visit iran soon. syria slams the israeli regime sunday night attacks, which have killed 16 people. damascus has warned that the regimes escalating the situation could bear unpredictable repercussions.