Israel has halted the flow of commercial goods into Gaza, citing a tax dispute between Hamas and local merchants and cutting off a crucial supply route in a territory where most people rely on humanitarian assistance.
COGAT, the Israeli military agency responsible for overseeing humanitarian affairs in Gaza, announced the suspension in a statement. It said Gazan merchants had stopped coordinating with COGAT over the entry of commercial shipments.
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According to COGAT, the merchants said they were responding to a 10,000 shekel (€2,964) charge that Hamas had imposed on every truck entering Gaza, along with a requirement that 30% of their sales in the territory be conducted in cash.
Hamas later described the charge as a voluntary contribution from wealthy Gazans to a national fund intended to support people in need, including widows and orphans.
After three years of war, repeated displacement and severe limits on aid deliveries imposed by Israel, the majority of Gaza’s population now depends on relief supplies.
Displaced Palestinians, including children, gather at a distribution point to receive warm meals
A global hunger monitor warned in July that more than two-thirds of Gaza’s population could experience acute hunger by the end of the year. About two million people live in the territory, most of them in makeshift shelters.
Nahed Shhaibar, head of Gaza’s private transport union, said no trucks carrying commercial goods from Israel had entered Gaza that day.
He said, however, that trucks transporting humanitarian aid had crossed into the territory, along with commercial shipments from Egypt through an Israeli-controlled crossing.
COGAT said the merchants’ decision would reduce the combined flow of humanitarian and commercial trucks entering Gaza each day to about 300, roughly half the previous number.
Diplomats have said the daily total is already well below 600 trucks. Shhaibar put the figure at about 300, saying commercial vehicles accounted for roughly two-thirds of them.
Under a US-mediated agreement, Israel is required to permit at least 600 trucks carrying humanitarian aid to enter Gaza each day.
Israel maintains that the obligation applies only to 600 trucks and argues that commercial shipments are necessary to supplement humanitarian supplies.
Israeli forces have carried out more than 1,000 attacks on Gaza over the past 12 months, killing more than 1,400 Palestinians, including at least 300 children.
Read more: Life in Gaza remains ‘absolutely horrendous’, UN official says
