Israeli tycoon urges help for Palestinians

One week before a groundbreaking ceremony at a joint Israeli-Palestinian industrial park on the outskirts of the Gaza Strip, the latest Intifada broke out.

The project - brainchild and long-time dream of Israeli industrialist Stef Wertheimer - never materialised, and the dusty piece of land which once promised to transform the Middle East through economic growth and co-existence now lies barren and deserted.

Two years later, thousands of Israelis and Palestinians are dead.

There is no peace process, and both societies are in the grip of economic crises.

One could forgive Mr Wertheimer, the 76-year-old chairman and founder of manufacturing giant Iscar, if he were to devote his energies to shoring up his billion dollar empire, or considering retirement.

But the man whose companies are responsible for 10% of Israel's economic output is still surprisingly optimistic.

And he is armed with a new plan to transform the Middle East.

Dubbed the "mini-Marshall Plan," after the scheme which helped rebuild Europe after World War II, Mr Wertheimer is calling for massive injections of cash into the eastern Mediterranean - Jordan, Turkey, the Palestinian territories and Israel's minority populations - in an effort to stabilise the region.

The plan's aim is to ensure a GDP per capita of at least $6,000 per year for the region's inhabitants.

According to Mr Wertheimer, that figure has historically led to democratisation and cools the flames of fundamentalism that drive people to follow the likes of Osama bin Laden.

"People are dangerous when they have nothing to lose," says Wertheimer, in an interview at the Tefen Industrial Park in the northern Galilee, one of four such parks he has founded in Israel.