Israel Eases Gaza Blockade

Posted by shergald | Jun 21, 2010 | 9 |

….Will Allow In All Goods Except For Weapons

Substantiating the ruse that the siege of Gaza and the restriction of goods and food into Gaza is about Israel’s security needs is this report from the Associated Press yesterday: Some reported the announcement as a win for the peace activists, who have sent boats and flotillas to break the inhumane siege of Gaza over the past two years. After the slaughter of nine Turkish peace activists on the Mavi Marmara on the last flotilla, it was just impossible for Israeli hasbara to control the press, as more and more people around the world became cognizant of what Israel has been doing to the Gazan Palestinians.

JERUSALEM — Israel’s government decided Sunday to draw up a list of items banned from Gaza limited to weapons and materials deemed to have military uses and said the easing of the three-year-old blockade of the Palestinian territory would be implemented immediately.

The list of banned goods replaces an old list of allowed items that permitted only basic humanitarian supplies for the 1.5 million Gazans. Under the new system, the government said practically all non-military items can enter Gaza freely.

“From now on, there is a green light of approval for all goods to enter Gaza except for military items and materials that can strengthen Hamas’ military machine,” Israeli government spokesman Mark Regev said.

Israel decided on Thursday to ease the blockade under intense international pressure after its raid on a blockade-busting international flotilla bound for Gaza killed nine pro-Palestinian activists.

In a critical shift, Israel said it would allow construction materials into Gaza for projects approved by the Palestinian Authority, such as housing and schools, as long as the projects are under international supervision. Up to now, Israel has banned most construction materials,

It’s a beginning at least, although the Palestinians remain skeptical. The siege itself will continue.

95% of Gaza’s industries are either destroyed or closed due to lack of raw materials and equipment, unemploment is sky high, clean water is scarce because of destruction of treatment plants, and sewage is still dumped into the sea surrounding Gaza daily. And fishing is still limited to a few miles off the coast and enforced by the Israeli navy.

But it is at least a partial win for the leaders of past flotillas and the memory of the nine Turkish peace activists who were murdered on the Mavi Marmara.

But it was also about the future that Israel was facing. This summer, flotillas from Lebanon, Iran, Germany (organized by Jewish peace org), and England (another Jewish peace org), will attempt to break the siege. Another Turkish flotilla was also being discussed. Viva Palestina, the British pro-Palestinian org that sent a land convoy to Gaza last January, will send simultaneous land and sea convoys, expected to be quite large, this September.

For Israel, the future was fraught with more bad press, and repeated reminders of the massacre that occurred on the Turkish flotilla.

About The Author

shergald

9 Comments

shergald on June 21, 2010 at 12:29 pm

Reactions to the Israeli announcement are in, this one from Juan Cole:

Israel Makes Small Change to Gaza Blockade
Brands Lebanese Women’s Aid Mission `Hizbullah’

June 21, 2010

Edmund Sanders of the LAT puts the matter correctly when he says that Israel’s national security government (a subset of key cabinet ministers) took a “small step” Sunday in announcing a further easing of the Israeli blockade of civilian Palestinians in the Gaza strip. The new policy is said to envision the abolition of the list of permitted items in favor of a small list of goods not permitted because they have military uses.

But the Israelis can continue the blockade even with a smaller list of prohibited items by limiting truck traffic through the checkpoints. That traffic is tiny now compared to the period before 2006, and Sunday’s announcement may not increase it that much.

I wrote on Friday, “For one thing, how many items are let in is less important than the volume of each. The Irish Times quotes Robert Serry, the head of the Office for the Co-ordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA). During the first week in June, imports declined by a quarter, even though Israel expanded the list of allowed imports by 11 food and health items. OCHA says that the amount of staples and aid going into Gaza is only about 17% of the goods routinely allowed in before the blockade began. So an `easing’ would not even restore the status quo ante of pre-2007.”

The USG Open Source Center translated a report from Jerusalem Voice of Israel Network B in Hebrew on Sunday June 20 saying,

` “The coordinator of government activities in the territories informed the PA tonight that as of tomorrow morning, the number of trucks crossing through Kerem Shalom will be daily increased by 30%. Our correspondent Karmela Menashe reports that this will allow the daily entry of 140 trucks into the Gaza Strip through the Kerem Shalom crossing.’

If the increase is only 30% of the present truck traffic, that would be about 23% of the trucks that routinely traveled into Gaza before the blockade, up from the 17% of the pre-blockade number that has been characteristic in the past year. A “small step” indeed.

This small step was clearly impelled by fear of increased international condemnation by one country after another if the harsher blockade was kept in place. Further, there is a growing danger to Israel of international boycotts over its Apartheid policies. Even in Oakland, Ca., not to mention Stockholm. Since the steps announced Sunday will not in fact allow for a decent life for the Palestinians of Gaza, nor will they address their massive unemployment and poverty, they are unlikely entirely to relieve this pressure from global civil society.

The small change was also impelled by fear of the further 8 aid ships now planned by humanitarian aid workers for Gaza, each of which Israel is pledged to board and divert. That is 8 opportunities for further disasters like that aboard the ill-fated Turkish aid vessel, the Mavi Marmara, where one American and 8 Turks were shot to death by Israeli commandos.

The next confrontation is likely to be with two aid ships from Lebanon, organized by women’s groups, including Christian ones. The Mariam is named for Mother Mary.

On last Thursday, “Dozens of Christian and Muslim women gathered in prayer in a cave near Our Lady of Mantara in the town of Maghdushe, where Mary was said to have waited for Jesus while he was preaching nearby some 2,000 years ago” according to AFP.

Rima Farah told AFP, “The participants are committed to making progress and our only weapons are faith in the Virgin Mary and in humanity.” She also said expressed confidence that their prayers were being answered, in light of Israeli announcements about the easing of the blockade.

Another all-woman aid vessel, the Julia, has received permission from Lebanese Public Works and Transportation Minister Ghazi Aridi to set sail from Tripoli for Cyprus. He says it is none of his business where it goes after that. This procedure is a way of getting around Israeli threats of reprisals against Lebanon if its government lets the aid ships leave directly for Gaza from a Lebanese port. This way, Lebanon can insist that all it did was give the ships permission to leave for Cyprus. (Lebanese law also forbids him to authorize departure for Israeli-controlled ports, or for any ports where they do not have permission to land). If the ships depart Cyprus for Gaza, that step is unlikely to result in an Israeli strike on Nicosia, since Cyprus and Israel are not at war and Greece would rather mind.

Al-Hayat [Life], reporting in Arabic, says that Israeli radio carried assertions from sources in the Israeli foreign ministry that these two ships are actually backed by the Lebanese Shiite fundamentalist party-militia, Hizbullah. They said that the party forbade singer Haifa Wahbi to board the ships, on the grounds that her steamy music videos would overshadow the mission and give the wrong impression of it. But this ridiculous charge is just a piece of gossip picked up from the Kuwaiti newspaper al-Siyasah, which is rather distant from the scene.

Read on HERE:

http://www.juancole.com/2010/06/israel-makes-small-change-to-gaza-blockade-brands-lebanese-womens-ai
d-mission-hizbullah.html

With Israel, it is always a question of reading between the lines, or looking for actions rather than words.
- Hurria on June 21, 2010 at 5:57 pm
  
  a”With Israel, it is always a question of reading between the lines…“
  
  You are being entirely too kind. With Israel it is always safest to assume mendacity. You will, on rare occasions, be pleasantly surprised.
  - shergald on June 21, 2010 at 7:12 pm
    
    We have to mull over the details. Just what materials can be put to military uses? There is also the question of raw materials needed to get Gaza’s industries moving. And how much of anything will be permitted inside Gaza?
    
    The details!
    - Hurria on June 22, 2010 at 1:43 pm
      
      “Just what materials can be put to military uses?“
      
      You name it, and it can be designated as dual use. I have done research on this question in regard to the grossly overblown question of Egypt’s supposed blockade in 1967 of the Strait of Tiran (which was perfectly legal, although it was minimal and hardly enforced), and later in regard to the 13 year blockade on Iraq, which included things like pencils, paper, strings for musical instruments, medical journals, ash trays, petri dishes, and on and on and on.
      
      “There is also the question of raw materials needed to get Gaza’s industries moving.“
      
      There isn’t a single item there that Israel cannot deny entry as having potential military use.
      
      “And how much of anything will be permitted inside Gaza?“
      
      And of course here is where the mendacious Israelis can really have a ball. They can claim they are letting in everything and yet continue to strangle and starve the Gazans by limiting the quantities, and it does sound as if that is part of their plan.
      - shergald on June 22, 2010 at 1:47 pm
        
        The deviousness never ends. I know that Egypt is preventing cement into Gaza, but will Mubarak break with Israel again, and allow raw meterials in?
        
        Another thing: Israel said it would allow cement into Gaza for rebuilding houses providing it is done under international supervision. What do you make of that proposal?
      - Hurria on June 22, 2010 at 5:53 pm
        
        “Israel said it would allow cement into Gaza for rebuilding houses providing it is done under international supervision. What do you make of that proposal?“
        
        It doesn’t look that bad on the face of it, but it’s easy to see how they will use it to limit building or prevent it altogether while pretending to be magnanimous.
        
        After the Oslo fakery I would not put anything past them.
      - shergald on June 23, 2010 at 2:02 pm
        
        We have all become cynical. Rightly so. Charlie Brown has pulled the football away so many times now, it is almost expected.
      - Hurria on June 24, 2010 at 3:29 am
        
        Perfect analogy except that it is Lucy who pulls the football away, and we who are Charlie Brown. :o}
  - shergald on June 21, 2010 at 8:05 pm
    
    Press Release from the Institute for Middle East Understanding:
    
    Is “Blockade Light” the Answer for Gazans Under Siege?
    
    In the wake of the global outcry following the IDF’s deadly raid on a flotilla of aid ships headed to Gaza, Israel announced it will “ease” the blockade of the besieged Gaza Strip. While the United States and the UK have praised the planned alterations to the restrictive blockade regime, the reaction of much of the international community was cooler. The Palestinians, along with European Union officials, called for more drastic measures to bring the siege to an end. Human rights organizations such as the International Comittee of the Red Cross (ICRC), Amnesty International, Oxfam and Save the Children insisted that the siege was a form of collective punishment and that only a complete end to the blockade would suffice to end the suffering of a population where at least 20% of children are believed to suffer from post traumatic stress disorders and poverty rates are skyrocketing.

Israel Eases Gaza Blockade

About The Author

shergald

9 Comments

Recent Posts

Recent Comments