[Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents Volume 32, Number 46 (Monday, November 18, 1996)]
[Pages 2388-2390]
[Online from the Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

<R04>
Proclamation 6955--To Provide Duty-Free Treatment to Products of the 
West Bank and the Gaza Strip and Qualifying Industrial Zones

November 13, 1996

By the President of the United States

of America

A Proclamation

    1. Section 9(a) of the United States-Israel Free Trade Area 
Implementation Act of 1985, as amended (the ``Act'') (19 U.S.C. 2112 
note), authorizes the President to proclaim elimination or modification 
of any existing duty under certain conditions as the President 
determines is necessary to exempt any article of the West Bank or Gaza 
Strip or a qualifying industrial zone from duty.
    2. Section 9(c) of the Act authorizes the President to proclaim that 
articles of Israel may be treated as though they were articles directly 
shipped from Israel for the purposes of the U.S.-Israel Free Trade 
Agreement (the ``Agreement'') even if shipped to the

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United States from the West Bank, the Gaza Strip, or a qualifying 
industrial zone, if the articles otherwise meet the requirements of the 
Agreement.
    3. Section 9(d) of the Act authorizes the President to proclaim that 
the cost or value of materials produced in the West Bank, the Gaza 
Strip, or a qualifying industrial zone may be included in the cost or 
value of materials produced in Israel under section 1(c)(i) of Annex 3 
of the Agreement, and the direct costs of processing operations 
performed in the West Bank, the Gaza Strip, or a qualifying industrial 
zone may be included in the direct costs of processing operations 
performed in Israel under section 1(c)(ii) of Annex 3 of the Agreement.
    4. Section 9(e) of the Act authorizes the President to specify areas 
that constitute qualifying industrial zones for purposes of the Act.
    5. Pursuant to section 9(a) of the Act, I have determined that the 
Harmonized Tariff Schedule of the United States (HTS) should be modified 
to provide duty-free entry to qualifying articles that are the product 
of the West Bank or Gaza Strip or a qualifying industrial zone and are 
entered in accordance with the provisions of section 9 of the Act.
    6. I have decided that articles of Israel may be treated as though 
they were articles directly shipped from Israel for the purposes of the 
Agreement even if shipped to the United States from the West Bank, the 
Gaza Strip, or a qualifying industrial zone, if the articles otherwise 
meet the requirements of the Agreement.
    7. I have decided that the cost or value of materials produced in 
the West Bank, the Gaza Strip, or a qualifying industrial zone may be 
included in the cost or value of materials produced in Israel under 
section 1(c)(i) of Annex 3 of the Agreement, and the direct costs of 
processing operations performed in the West Bank, the Gaza Strip, or a 
qualifying industrial zone may be included in the direct costs of 
processing operations performed in Israel under section 1(c)(ii) of 
Annex 3 of the Agreement.
    8. Section 604 of the Trade Act of 1974 (19 U.S.C. 2483) authorizes 
the President to embody in the HTS the substance of the provisions of 
that Act, and of other acts affecting import treatment, and actions 
thereunder.
    Now, Therefore, I, William J. Clinton, President of the United 
States of America, acting under the authority vested in me by the 
Constitution and the laws of the United States, including but not 
limited to section 301 of title 3, United States Code, section 9 of the 
Act (19 U.S.C. 2112 note), and section 604 of the Trade Act of 1974 (19 
U.S.C. 2483), do proclaim that:
    (1) In order to provide the tariff treatment being accorded under 
the Act, the HTS is modified as set forth in the Annex to this 
proclamation.
    (2) I delegate to the United States Trade Representative the powers 
granted to me in section 9(e) of the Act to specify through notice in 
the Federal Register areas constituting qualifying industrial zones.
    (3) The modifications to the HTS made by the Annex shall be 
effective with respect to goods entered, or withdrawn from warehouse for 
consumption, on and after the third day after the date of publication of 
this proclamation in the Federal Register. 
    (4) All provisions of previous proclamations and Executive orders 
that are inconsistent with the actions taken in this proclamation are 
superseded to the extent of such inconsistency.
    In Witness Whereof, I have hereunto set my hand this thirteenth day 
of November, in the year of our Lord nineteen hundred and ninety-six, 
and of the Independence of the United States of America the two hundred 
and twenty-first.
                                            William J. Clinton

[Filed with the Office of the Federal Register, 8:45 a.m., November 15, 
1996]

Note: This proclamation was released by the Office of the Press 
Secretary on November 14, and it was published in the Federal Register 
on November 18.

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