The daily pain experienced by ordinary Gazan Arabs and its cause

Trucks filled with food and essential goods are lined up outside Gaza. Would it surprise you to know the role that money plays in this?

Frimet/Arnold Roth..
This Ongoing War..
04 March '13..

The Gaza Strip, tightly ruled by the terrorist Hamas organization for the past seven years, depends on the import of a wide range of goods for its existence. Hamas has invested close to zero in economic infrastructure and means of production for reasons that are obvious to people who understand what terrorist organizations exist to do. Thus, since Gaza no longer has an airport (see "Gaza airport destroyed by scavengers", imported goods arrive via three land routes: the border-crossing with Israel, the border-crossing with Egypt and a vast network of tunnels from Egyptian Sinai.

The sole crossing for the goods that pass in both directions between Gaza and Israel is Kerem Shalom, the 'Vineyard of Peace'. But it's not especially peaceful. This is where, in June 2006, infiltrators from Gaza tunneled under the border and attacked an IDF patrol, killing two soldiers, wounding three others, and kidnapping Gilad Shalit whom they then illegally and cruelly held hostage for five years. Last August (2012), armed terrorists ambushed an Egyptian military base in Sinai close to Kerem Shalom, killed 16 Egyptian soldiers there and commandeered two Egyptian armored cars with which they forced their way across the border into Israel via Kerem Shalom. In the ensuing firefight with an IDF contingent, six of those attackers were killed and, fortunately, all the Israelis were uninjured.

A measure of the important role Kerem Shalom plays in the life of Gaza is that, during 2012, an average of 250 filled truckloads of goods passed through en route to the Gaza Strip daily according to Wikipedia (though the IDF says 300).

For the past six days, Kerem Shalom has been closed. This was Israel's non-violent response to last week's rocket attack on Ashkelon [see "3-Mar-13: The terrorists of Gaza keep trying to destroy the electric power station that feeds them"] as well as to a sniper attack on Friday in which the personal military vehicle of the Gaza Division's Northern Brigade was hit. Then yesterday (Sunday) the head of COGAT said Kerem Shalom, as well as the Rafah Crossing which is for people, not goods, would re-open on Monday morning i.e. today. COGAT is a key IDF unit that is responsible for responsible for implementing the Israeli government's policies in Judea, and Samaria and in relation to Hamas-controlled Gaza

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