NABLUS, West Bank: A few weeks ago Ahmed Shataye rarely attempted the journey from his tiny village to his market stall in Nablus. Israeli roadblocks made the trip almost impossible.

But these days business is booming.

In June Israel decided to remove checkpoints around the city as part of a plan for ‘economic peace’ with the Palestinians.

‘I'm here every day now and sales are up by at least 50 per cent,’ says the market trader from Salem, a mountain village about five miles outside Nablus, for years one of the occupied West Bank's more militant strongholds.

Shataye buys honeycomb and cheeses from other villagers to sell in Nablus at a profit. But until recently, covering the short distance to the city could take all day.

‘It took so long to get here that by the time I arrived the market would be closed. Sometimes I wouldn't get through at all. Often I would open the stall only once in a couple of weeks.’

Up until just a few months ago, six Israeli checkpoints surrounding Nablus had put a stranglehold on the local economy. Now a steady stream of vehicles flows through the main Hawarra roadblock just outside the city, most provoking no more than a cursory nod from the Israeli troops on guard.

At the pharmacy on the busy main street trade is brisk.

‘All these goods come from China, through Israeli ports in Haifa and Ashdod,’ says Ahmed Hani, the shop's owner, showing off shelves stacked to the ceiling with multi-coloured shampoo bottles.

‘Lately it has been much easier to get the cargoes through,’ he explains.

Things started to improve in June with a decision by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to open roadblocks surrounding the city, part of a plan to ease tensions in the West Bank by boosting the local economy.

Israeli officials have long claimed that the heavy restrictions were essential to prevent violent attacks.

But the prime minister was also keen to put into action his much-vaunted plan.

‘This is the highway to peace,’ Netanyahu told journalists on June 28, coining his administration's latest catchphrase.

Several highways across the West Bank remain off-limits to Palestinians, however, and while some major checkpoints have been removed, there are still more than 600 roadblocks across the territory, according to UN figures.

Freedom of movement is further affected by Israeli settlements across the West Bank and the Israeli separation barrier.

But speaking to visiting Republicans from the US Congress, President Shimon Peres insisted recently that the West Bank ‘is growing economically, enjoying greater freedom than ever before, and it is all happening even before we have signed a peace agreement.’

The International Monetary Fund said last month the West Bank economy could grow by seven per cent this year if Israel continues easing the massive web of restrictions on the movement of goods and people that it imposed in the wake of the 2000 Palestinian uprising.

‘The trade has been so restricted up till now, if all of a sudden you relax them, you're going to have growth,’ said Oussama Kanaan, the IMF chief of mission in the West Bank and Gaza.

The growth forecast is also based on significant improvements in the security situation.

‘People feel safe and we are getting a lot more customers,’ says 20-year-old Mohammed Ghossam from behind the counter in his family's grocery store in the old city of Nablus, until recently a lawless city where gangsters and militants held sway.

Ofir Gendelman, chief executive of the Israel-Palestinian Chamber of Commerce is equally upbeat.

‘Everyone agrees that the Palestinian security forces are doing much better lately,’ he says.

While sporadic armed clashes have in recent months broken out elsewhere in the West Bank, Nablus's population of 170,000 has enjoyed relative calm. All over town Palestinian police are much in evidence, lounging in plastic chairs on street corners, rifles across their laps.

‘People are simply fed up with the violence. The atmosphere is much better,’ Gendelman said.

Before his rightwing Likud party won power in elections in February, Netanyahu made clear that the Palestinian economy would be the basis of his efforts towards peace.

As part of his campaign, the hawkish premier promised not to hand back any occupied Palestinian territory until the West Bank economy showed signs of revival.
But once in power he found himself under increasing global pressure, particularly from Israel's closest ally the United States, to show progress on the 'political track' towards a deal for Israeli-Palestinian peace.

His government insists it is not pushing ‘economic peace’ as a substitute for politics — but on the Palestinian side, there is a strong suspicion that it is just that.

‘As Netanyahu tries to divert world attention by proposing economic measures instead of political rights, we tell him that our most noble political objective is independence and the creation of the state of Palestine with Jerusalem as its capital,’ Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas said recently. — AFP