MIDDLE EAST: Israel's Dor Alon energy company plans to resume vital petroleum shipments to Palestinians today after halting supplies over unpaid bills, a senior Palestinian official said.
The head of the Palestinian Petroleum Agency, Mujahed Salameh, said the deal was reached after Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas sent a letter to Dor Alon guaranteeing to send funds within 10 days.
The fuel shortage had threatened to worsen economic woes that began when western countries froze aid and cut most diplomatic contacts with the Hamas-led Palestinian Authority.
Dor Alon is the sole supplier of petrol and cooking gas to Palestinian areas. Two days after it cut off deliveries on Tuesday, petrol stations stood empty across the occupied West Bank.
"Dor will resume fuel supplies tomorrow to the Palestinian areas," Mr Salameh said, referring to the Gaza Strip and the occupied West Bank.
The impoverished Gaza Strip also felt the crunch, and petrol station owners in Gaza, home to 1.4 million Palestinians, said supplies were likely to be depleted by the end of the day.
In his letter to Dor Alon, Mr Abbas pledged payment of 132 million shekels (€23.3 million), Mr Salameh said. He estimated the total debt to Dor Alon at 400 million shekels (€70.6 million).
Mr Salameh said earlier that factories, bakeries and public transport might be forced to stop work unless fuel supplies resumed. Emergency service workers said they feared they would be unable to reach patients in rural areas.
But in a sign that the overall economic crisis could soon ease, the Quartet of Middle East peace mediators - the United States, Russia, the European Union and the United Nations - decided on Tuesday to resume some aid payments to Palestinians.
They agreed to create a new mechanism for funnelling funds to the Palestinians that would run for a three-month trial period and was expected to bypass the Hamas-led government. Israel said it could also help by releasing, for humanitarian needs, some of the $55 million (€43 million) in tax it collects monthly on behalf of the Palestinian Authority. - (additional reporting by Labib Nasir)