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Without getting deep into politics I don't understand why they would prioritize spending effort on DST at all, seems like there are plenty of other concerns.

DoughnutHole 2y ago
If your life is dominated by an us vs them dynamic small demonstrations of difference become hugely important. In a similar vein different people in Xinjiang in China observe entirely different timezones - Han Chinese observe Beijing time (because China is insane and uses one timezone despite spanning 5), while Uyghurs observe a local time 2 hours behind. It’s a small show of resistance, which is sometimes all a people have if they have limited control of their own affairs.
jdietrich 2y ago
Again, without wanting to get too political, I think it's essentially bikeshedding. The Palestinian National Authority is riven with factional conflicts and has very limited state capacity. That almost inevitably leads to a lot of bickering over largely irrelevant decisions as a symbolic but hollow demonstration of political authority. The ability to make the decision takes on an importance completely out of proportion with the actual significance of the decision.
grotorea 2y ago
I don't see why announcing DST would be a big effort. And it saves on electricity costs.
- macspoofing 2y ago
  Announcing is not a big effort. Having millions of people, and thousands of companies (in the territory and outside the territory) adjusting to the announcement is a big effort. If you're going to have DST, you want it to be stable and predictable so that people can plan for it.
- Kwpolska 2y ago
  Even if DST did save something (it does not), it becomes a problem when your timekeeping is done by computers. My computers know I live in Poland (Europe/Warsaw), and they know the DST rules. I can trust the time on my computers’ clock matches the official time the government recognizes. In Palestine, this depends on my OS vendor managing to update the tz database in the short window before the official announcement and the decision coming into force. (I believe the tz database makes some assumptions based on past performance, but the government can change their mind any year.) If my OS does not update, I need to change my time zone manually to something that has the right UTC offset, and then I need to manually change back in the autumn, and I can never be 100% sure if any given computer shows the official time.
FateOfNations 2y ago
Most of the population there is interested in those dates for non-DST-related reasons. They will want to know when Ramadan begins and ends, regardless of whether it's used to determine DST.
ComputerGuru 2y ago
You (and everyone else opining here) are missing the practical context: DST makes Ramadan easier, because the sun sets an hour earlier. Yes, you are fasting the same number of hours, but your day “starts” at a point fixed to the TZ-adjusted clock and the sooner sunset arrives, the shorter your effective day.

DoughnutHole 2y ago

If your life is dominated by an us vs them dynamic small demonstrations of difference become hugely important. In a similar vein different people in Xinjiang in China observe entirely different timezones - Han Chinese observe Beijing time (because China is insane and uses one timezone despite spanning 5), while Uyghurs observe a local time 2 hours behind. It’s a small show of resistance, which is sometimes all a people have if they have limited control of their own affairs.

jdietrich 2y ago

Again, without wanting to get too political, I think it's essentially bikeshedding. The Palestinian National Authority is riven with factional conflicts and has very limited state capacity. That almost inevitably leads to a lot of bickering over largely irrelevant decisions as a symbolic but hollow demonstration of political authority. The ability to make the decision takes on an importance completely out of proportion with the actual significance of the decision.

grotorea 2y ago

I don't see why announcing DST would be a big effort. And it saves on electricity costs.

macspoofing 2y ago
Announcing is not a big effort. Having millions of people, and thousands of companies (in the territory and outside the territory) adjusting to the announcement is a big effort. If you're going to have DST, you want it to be stable and predictable so that people can plan for it.
Kwpolska 2y ago
Even if DST did save something (it does not), it becomes a problem when your timekeeping is done by computers. My computers know I live in Poland (Europe/Warsaw), and they know the DST rules. I can trust the time on my computers’ clock matches the official time the government recognizes. In Palestine, this depends on my OS vendor managing to update the tz database in the short window before the official announcement and the decision coming into force. (I believe the tz database makes some assumptions based on past performance, but the government can change their mind any year.) If my OS does not update, I need to change my time zone manually to something that has the right UTC offset, and then I need to manually change back in the autumn, and I can never be 100% sure if any given computer shows the official time.

FateOfNations 2y ago

Most of the population there is interested in those dates for non-DST-related reasons. They will want to know when Ramadan begins and ends, regardless of whether it's used to determine DST.

ComputerGuru 2y ago

You (and everyone else opining here) are missing the practical context: DST makes Ramadan easier, because the sun sets an hour earlier. Yes, you are fasting the same number of hours, but your day “starts” at a point fixed to the TZ-adjusted clock and the sooner sunset arrives, the shorter your effective day.