The Israeli siege on the Gaza Strip has now entered its 10th year. Israel had imposed a blockade in mid-2006 on the small enclave after the Hamas movement won the Palestinian legislative elections in January of that year. Ever since, the Palestinians’ humanitarian situation has been going downhill. Unemployment rates surpassed 43%, the gross domestic product dropped 24%, poverty rates reached 39% and food insecurity amounted to 47%.

On Jan. 15, the Israeli Defense Ministry announced a 165% increase of goods in 2016 — compared with 2015 — that are smuggled from Israel into the Gaza Strip through the Kerem Shalom crossing in southern Gaza and the Erez crossing in the north. In 2016, 175,000 commercial trucks entered Gaza, 1,126 of which were caught smuggling goods, such as cameras, communication devices, iron rods and aluminum tubes, which Israel has banned from entering Gaza since 2008.

Maher al-Tabbaa, the media director at the Gaza Chamber of Commerce, told Al-Monitor, “The figures Israel announced regarding the smuggled goods into Gaza are exaggerated. The truth is, every once in a while some individual cases of smuggling occur. Israel imposed strict security measures [on the crossings] and severe sanctions against Palestinian merchants who [are caught] trying to smuggle goods. These measures include long prison sentences and costly fines.”

In January 2016, Israeli NGO Gisha issued a list of over 60 items banned from entering the Gaza Strip under the pretext of the products’ dual use (civilian and military), such as coriander, wood, electrical uninterruptible power supplies, castor oil, fertilizers, X-ray imaging devices, heavy cranes, tubes, batteries and metal welding material.