RAMALLAH, Monday, March 11, 2019 (WAFA) – The designation of member of Fatah’s Central Committee and economist Mohammad Shtayyeh as a replacement for outgoing Prime Minister Rami Hamdallah hit the front page headlines in Monday’s issue of the three Palestinian dailies today.

Al-Quds and al-Hayat al-Jadida reported that President Mahmoud Abbas assigned Mohammad Shtayyeh to form the new 18^th government.

Al-Ayyam said that Abbas has set seven main tasks for the new government to fulfill, and Shtayyeh starts consultations with the factions of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) as well as social and political figures.

The newly-appointed prime minister was also reported in al-Quds stating: “I am fully aware of the situation we are going through politically and economically.”

Al-Ayyam added in this regard that Hamas does not recognize the new government.

Additionally, the dailies reported Finance Minister Shukry Bishara announcing the adoption of an emergency budget to face Israel’s withholding of the Palestinian tax revenues.

Elaborating on Bishara’s decision, al-Ayyam explained that the emergency budget would include a number of austerity measures, including the suspension of employments and promotions as well as the sale of government vehicles and buildings.

It added that Palestinian civil servants will receive only 50 percent of their salary but no less than 2000 shekels.

Furthermore, the dailies reported that Abbas received a delegation of the left-wing Israeli party of Meretz and Norwegian Foreign Minister Ine Eriksen Søreide in Ramallah.

The dailies also reported that Israeli forces shot dead a Palestinian man near the West Bank city of Jericho.

Salameh Saleh Kaabneh, 22, a resident of Fasayel, was killed while attempting to pass an Israeli checkpoint on road 90 near Jericho.

Al-Quds and al-Ayyam highlighted the expansion of the illegal Israeli settlement inhabited by hardcore Jews, Yitzhar, south of Nablus, at the expense of Palestinian lands.

According to al-Quds, Israeli police stormed and took measurements of Bab al-Rahma prayer area inside Jerusalem’s Al-Aqsa Mosque compound, while al-Ayyam said that Israel has threatened to close the site with a court order.

Al-Quds said that the White House has assured Evangelical leaders that US President Donald Trump’s Mideast plan, dubbed deal of the century, would not include a call to divide Jerusalem.

Both dailies highlighted Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s remarks that Israel is “not the state of all its citizens”, in reference to the country’s non-Jewish population but that it is a Jewish state only.

Netanyahu wrote on social media: “Israel is not a state of all its citizens. According to the Nation-State Law that we passed, Israel is the nation-state of the Jewish People - and them alone.”

Netanyahu made his comments in response to a comment by Israeli model and media figure Rotem Sela, who wrote on social media that Israel is a country for all its citizens: “Arabs, too, God helps us, are human beings.”

Al-Ayyam said that Israeli forces demolished a poultry barn and uprooted dozens of fruitful trees in al-Arroub refugee camp, in the south of the West Bank.

It added that Israeli warplanes pounded several locations across the besieged Gaza Strip, including the headquarters of the Engineers Association.

It also reported that settlers razed a large tract of Palestinian land in Jalud village, near the northern West Bank city of Nablus.

K.F./M.K.