Israel Suspends Work Permits, Driving West Bank Youth Unemployment Crisis

In the occupied West Bank, Palestinian university graduates face rising unemployment and shrinking job opportunities as economic contraction, public sector instability and emigration reshape the labor market.

Figures cited by the Palestine Economic Policy Research Institute (MAS) show nearly 40 percent of young Palestinians in the occupied West Bank holding at least a diploma are unemployed, and overall unemployment has more than doubled since October 2023.

Al Jazeera

The crisis intensified after Israel suspended work permits for 115,000 Palestinians from the West Bank employed in Israel following the start of the war on Gaza, with only a limited number of those permits renewed.

Bethlehem University academic and career counselor Enass Elias said, “These students are giving their studies their best, and are reaching the stage where they say, ‘What do I want with a degree?’ Psychologically, they are exhausted.”

In Britain, a government-backed review led by Alan Milburn warns the country risks a “lost generation” unless ministers confront the collapse in youth employment.

The review says the number of young people classed as NEET could rise from around one in eight today to one in six by 2031, equivalent to approximately 1.25 million people.

Courrier international

Milburn described the crisis as “much worse” than he had initially anticipated and said, “We are at risk of a lost generation,” ahead of the report’s publication.

The review argues that first jobs, apprenticeships and work experience opportunities have steadily disappeared, leaving many young people locked in what Milburn calls a “hopeless Catch-22,” adding that “Six in ten have never had a job.”

In Jordan, Al-Ghad reported on Monday, August 18, that Crown Prince Hussein bin Abdullah announced the restoration of military service one day earlier, framing it as a need to prepare youth to protect and defend the homeland.

“His fingers are raised in the shape of a 'V'”

La Croix

The Courrier international report says military service had been abolished in the early 1990s, lasted two years at the time, and is now planned to last only three months, with an initial involvement of about 6,000 people starting next February.

Courrier international also links the decision to concerns about instability in Syria, including the risk of infiltration and smuggling networks, and to Israeli announcements to build a new settlement in the West Bank and statements by ultra-nationalist Israeli minister Bezalel Smotrich.

In the occupied West Bank, Al Jazeera’s Leila Warah reports that “There are only enough jobs for about half the students who graduate university here in the occupied West Bank,” underscoring how limited hiring capacity and unemployment pressures shape young people’s prospects.