Gaza: Israel Stops Processing Key Commercial Food Imports

Israel has stopped processing requests from traders to import food to Gaza, according to 12 people involved in the trade, choking off a track that for the past six months supplied more than half of the besieged Palestinian territory’s provisions.

Since Oct. 11, Gaza-based traders who were importing food from Israel and the Israeli-occupied West Bank have lost access to a system introduced in spring by Cogat, the Israeli government body that oversees aid and commercial shipments, and have received no reply to attempts to contact the agency, the sources said.

The shift has driven the flow of goods arriving in Gaza to its lowest level since the start of the war, analysis of official Israeli data shows. The details of the halt in commercial goods into Gaza have not been previously reported. Reports said

Cogat did not respond to Reuters’ questions about commercial food imports and aid to Gaza. The agency says it does all it can to ensure that enough aid enters the coastal enclave and that Israel does not prevent the entry of humanitarian aid. It rejects allegations that Israel has blocked supplies.

Between Oct. 1 and Oct. 16, the overall flow of shipments to Gaza – including both aid and commercial goods – fell to a daily average of 29 trucks, according to Cogat statistics.

That compares with a daily average of 175 trucks between May and September, the data shows.

Commercial shipments — goods bought by local traders, trucked in after direct approval by Cogat, and then sold in marketplaces in Gaza — accounted for about 55% of the total during that period

Revenues
Two sources involved in food supply said the reason for halting commercial shipments was because Israel worried that the Hamas militant group was receiving revenues from the imports.

A Hamas spokesperson denied that the group had stolen food or used it for revenue and said it was trying to ensure the distribution of aid in Gaza.

The commercial system’s apparent closure came as Israel launched a new military operation against Hamas in northern Gaza, a parallel development that has obstructed humanitarian aid deliveries. The U.N.’s World Food Programme said in a statement that on Sunday, the operation cut off all aid deliveries through crossings in the north for at least two weeks this month.

Plummeting volumes of aid into Gaza has prompted the United States to threaten to withhold military support to Israel.

A series of measures by Israeli government departments and the military were already reducing food deliveries to Gaza. In August, Israeli authorities introduced a new customs rule on one aid channel and began scaling down the separate track of commercial goods.

Getting enough food to Gaza’s 2.3 million people, almost all of whom have been displaced, has been one of the most fraught issues of the war. Aid agencies have renewed their warnings of widening malnutrition and the danger of famine.

Warnings of Famine
James Elder, a spokesman for U.N. child agency UNICEF said aid supply had improved earlier this year after warnings of famine prompted a push to open new supply routes and access points to Gaza.

“We’ve seen an absolute reversal of that,” he told reporters this week. “We see now what is probably the worst restrictions we’ve seen on humanitarian aid” to Gaza during the war.

Before the war, some 500 trucks per day entered Gaza carrying a mix of aid and commercial imports, such as food, building materials, and agricultural supplies.

“The situation is getting desperate,” said Ibrahim Baraka, a resident of southern Gaza. “We have some non-perishable aid, but there’s virtually no fresh produce anymore. A kilo of onions is $15 in southern Gaza.”

His account was corroborated by five other residents, seven traders, and five humanitarian workers.

Reuters/Shakirat Sadiq