Gaza Strip exports to Israel resumed yesterday as Israel reopened a trade crossing, days after shutting it over an alleged attempt to smuggle explosives from the Palestinian enclave.
Israeli army chief of staff Herzi Halevi last Monday ordered an immediate halt of all commercial deliveries from Gaza to Israel following the alleged attempt to “smuggle high-quality explosives”.
Gaza, home to around 2.3mn Palestinians, is under a tight land, air and sea blockade imposed by Israel, whose defence ministry controls all crossings except Rafah which is controlled by Egypt.
Yesterday morning the Kerem Shalom gateway was reopened, said Raed Fattouh, head of the Presidential Committee for the Co-ordination of Goods, which is affiliated to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’ Fatah party.
“Several trucks, including one loaded with readymade clothes and others loaded with scrap iron, entered the crossing this morning and headed towards the Israeli side,” he said.
Cogat, the body running civilian affairs in the Palestinian territories, confirmed the reopening of the crossing from yesterday at 6:00am (0300 GMT) “following the conclusion of a security assessment”. Palestinian businesses had warned that shutting the crossing would trigger a “humanitarian catastrophe” in the Gaza Strip. “When the Kerem Shalom crossing is open we have work, otherwise we will die because we won’t be able to export our vegetables,” said Atta Tabasi, an exporter of tomatoes.
The closure of the Kerem Shalom crossing came amid rising violence in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict which has seen at least 227 Palestinians killed so far this year.
At least 32 Israelis, one Ukrainian and one Italian have also been killed, according to an AFP tally based on official sources on both sides. The dead include, on the Palestinian side, combatants
as well as civilians and, on the Israeli side, three members of the Arab minority.
Palestinian farmers pick tomatoes slated for export at a field in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip, yesterday.
