GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip — Gaza’s merchants fear passing through Erez, the only Israeli crossing open to people. Many have been arrested while using the Erez crossing over the last two months, on charges of smuggling materials on the prohibited list — such as chemicals and steel for construction — that Israel implemented at the beginning of its blockade in 2006 on the Gaza Strip. The siege intensified with the destruction of the tunnels on the Egyptian border in 2013, and the renewed closing of the Rafah crossing.
Since the beginning of 2015, Israeli authorities have arrested 11 Palestinian merchants traveling through the Erez crossing, charging them with the formation of a ring that “smuggles prohibited raw materials” to resistance factions inside Gaza, to restore their capabilities lost after the war last summer, i.e., rebuild the tunnels. Three Israeli merchants were also arrested at the end of February on charges of cooperating with Palestinian merchants in smuggling materials to the resistance, which many Palestinian merchants denied.
