Israeli Document: Gaza Blockade Isn't About Security

[tekisui]

Source: McClatchy

JERUSALEM — As Israel ordered a slight easing of its blockade of the Gaza Strip Wednesday, McClatchy obtained an Israeli government document that describes the blockade not as a security measure but as "economic warfare" against the Islamist group Hamas, which rules the Palestinian territory.

Israel imposed severe restrictions on Gaza in June 2007, after Hamas won elections and took control of the coastal enclave after winning elections there the previous year, and the government has long said that the aim of the blockade is to stem the flow of weapons to militants in Gaza.

Last week, after Israeli commandos killed nine volunteers on a Turkish-organized Gaza aid flotilla, Israel again said its aim was to stop the flow of terrorist arms into Gaza.

However, in response to a lawsuit by Gisha, an Israeli human rights group, the Israeli government explained the blockade as an exercise of the right of economic warfare.

"A country has the right to decide that it chooses not to engage in economic relations or to give economic assistance to the other party to the conflict, or that it wishes to operate using 'economic warfare,'" the government said.

McClatchy obtained the government's written statement from Gisha, the Legal Center for Freedom of Movement, which sued the government for information about the blockade. The Israeli high court upheld the suit, and the government delivered its statement earlier this year.

Sari Bashi, the director of Gisha, said the documents prove that Israel isn't imposing its blockade for its stated reasons, but rather as collective punishment for the Palestinian population of Gaza. Gisha focuses on Palestinian rights.

The Israeli government took an additional step Wednesday and said the economic warfare is intended to achieve a political goal. A government spokesman, who couldn't be named as a matter of policy, told McClatchy that authorities will continue to ease the blockade but "could not lift the embargo altogether as long as Hamas remains in control" of Gaza.

President Barack Obama, after receiving Mahmoud Abbas, the head of the Palestinian Authority, said the situation in Gaza is "unsustainable." He pledged an additional $400 million in aid for housing, school construction and roads to improve daily life for Palestinians — of which at least $30 million is earmarked for Gaza.

Israel's blockade of Gaza includes a complex and ever-changing list of goods that are allowed in. Items such as cement or metal are barred because they can be used for military purposes, Israeli officials say.

According to figures published by Gisha in coordination with the United Nations, Israel allows in 25 percent of the goods it had permitted into Gaza before the Hamas takeover. In the years prior to the closure, Israel allowed an average of 10,400 trucks to enter Gaza with goods each month. Israel now allows approximately 2,500 trucks a month.


Read more: http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2010/06/09/95621/israeli-document-gaza-blockade.html#ixzz0qOmPv6Lf

[Hell Hath No Fury]

1. Gaza is nothin' but an Arab ghetto..

Congratulations, Israel.

[RC]

3. You forgot to add "for making it so."

[malaise]

2. The day will come when some other country

exercises the same economic warfare against them. I hope they don't mind.
What goes around comes around.

[Ignis]

4. Call it what it is: An Open-Air Prison

Specifically, a prison created for collective punishment.

Thanks for the article, Tekisui.

[xchrom]

5. Recommend

[DirkGently]

6. An important point

I think Newsweek suggested this a while ago, but this completely confirms it. The raid (and attendant killings) were not about Israeli security, but rather about Israel's strategy of trying to hurt Hamas by strangling commerce in Gaza. They weren't worried about guns and bombs getting through so much as making life as miserable as possible for people.

Nice.