Virtual Escape
Last April, the shareholders of PalTel, Palestine’s national telecommunications company, were scheduled to meet in the West Bank city of Ramallah. Such a meeting would hardly be newsworthy were it not for the complex network of more than 900 checkpoints, roadblocks, electronic fences, barriers, trenches, and razor wire Israel has erected to restrict Palestinian movement ...
Last April, the shareholders of PalTel, Palestine's national telecommunications company, were scheduled to meet in the West Bank city of Ramallah. Such a meeting would hardly be newsworthy were it not for the complex network of more than 900 checkpoints, roadblocks, electronic fences, barriers, trenches, and razor wire Israel has erected to restrict Palestinian movement within the territories. PalTel has some 4,000 shareholders, many of whom cannot attend meetings in person due to the extensive security perimeter. The solution? Gaza shareholders cast their votes via videoconferences.
Last April, the shareholders of PalTel, Palestine’s national telecommunications company, were scheduled to meet in the West Bank city of Ramallah. Such a meeting would hardly be newsworthy were it not for the complex network of more than 900 checkpoints, roadblocks, electronic fences, barriers, trenches, and razor wire Israel has erected to restrict Palestinian movement within the territories. PalTel has some 4,000 shareholders, many of whom cannot attend meetings in person due to the extensive security perimeter. The solution? Gaza shareholders cast their votes via videoconferences.
Increasingly, Internet technologies such as e–mail, telephone calls routed through the Internet (called voice over Internet protocol), and videoconferencing are enabling Palestinian students, judges, legislators, businesspeople, even married couples, to circumvent the physical barriers imposed by Israeli occupation. For instance, when Israeli forces entered Ramallah in March 2002, closing the city for months, Palnet, the leading Palestinian Internet service provider, was certain its company would face financial collapse. To its surprise, Internet usage soared. Palestine’s Birzeit University even launched an online academic portal, called Ritaj (ritaj.birzeit.edu), which allows students to complete their coursework from home.
Or consider the case of Jawwal, the Palestinian cellular telephone provider owned by PalTel. Jawwal’s headquarters receives about 2 million telephone calls per month. But the company’s employees can’t always make it to work. So Jawwal invested in a system that can route the calls to employees’ cellular phones. "Coupled with a situation where Palestinians are living in a big jail, technology becomes our foremost asset," says Hakam Kanafani, Jawwal’s chief executive officer.
That’s a theory the United Nations and other nongovernmental organizations are increasingly buying into. The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) recently allocated $250,000 to help the "emergency needs" of the Palestinian telecommunications ministry. In April, Palestine’s ".ps" top-level domain was launched, with help from the U.S. Agency for International Development and the UNDP. Says Timothy Rothermel, a special representative for the UNDP in Jerusalem, "Advances in information and communications technology offer profound new opportunities for development." For Palestinians, it’s a virtual escape.
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