Ben Bernanke worries about being held hostage to the global economy. The central banker for the Palestinian territories frets about hostage-taking of a different kind.

"Sometimes people take a gun to the head of a branch manager," says Jihad al-Wazir, governor of the Palestine Monetary Authority. "Then I get a phone call."

The PMA is a most unusual central bank. It lacks a currency and a country. It can't control interest rates or fight inflation, like other central banks.