ELDER OF ZIYON: The biggest Gaza myth of all

WAFA reports:

Quartet Representative Tony Blair Monday expressed deep concern regarding the grave humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip, worsened by the recent storm, urging immediate intervention to avoid a humanitarian catastrophe....

Blair urged all parties to act promptly to find a lasting solution to the ongoing energy crisis and encouraged the Israeli government to take the necessary steps to reopen the crossings and allow the movement of goods and people in order to rehabilitate the Gaza economy.

On Wednesday, I visited both the Erez and Kerem Shalom crossings and spoke to Israeli officials there.

I spend a lot of time reading about Gaza from Arabic and English news sources, but I learned a great deal from my meetings that I was unaware of. I hope to blog much more about it as I find time.

But there is one crucial fact about Gaza that has never been reported anywhere, as far as I can tell. And clearly, Tony Blair is unaware of this fact as well.

There is no reason whatsoever to "reopen the crossings" because Kerem Shalom can handle all of Gaza's import and export needs. 

In fact, Kerem Shalom can handle more goods than all of the closed crossings ever could - combined. 

Crossings such as Nahal Oz and Karni were closed over the years because they weren't secure. Those crossings were a tempting target for terrorists to attack. They can never re-open.

But Kerem Shalom - a hugely expansive and extraordinarily impressive feat of engineering and logistics - was sized to handle all of Gaza's needs if necessary. And it can do it without risking any Israeli lives (a forthcoming post will go into more detail.)

Here are all the limits of imports and exports to and from Gaza from what I learned today:

Besides a small list of "dual use" materials, Israel imposes no restrictions on Gaza imports. Even some of the "dual use" materials can be imported under certain conditions - for example, international NGOs can import construction materials. Israel allows potentally dual use items, such as CO2, to be imported on a case by case basis as well.

Some said that Gaza did not have adequate pumps to handle the flooding because of Israeli restrictions. Nonsense. I asked specifically if water pumps are a "dual use" item and they are not. This was Gaza's government not being prepared, and nothing to do with the "blockade."

If needed, Kerem Shalom can run on three shifts, 24/7. But today there isn't the demand. 

All Gaza imports are arranged between Gaza businessmen and NGOs, and Israeli or other suppliers. If Gazans needs more, they can buy it. There are no practical limits on how much Gaza can import even if its economy grew dramatically. No limits on fuel. No limits on raw materials for factories (again, except dual use materials.)

Kerem Shalom is building new pipelines for fuel, and increasing capacity of existing pipelines, in anticipation of a potential dramatic increase of demand as a result of Egypt's closure of Gaza. Right now, because of Hamas and PA infighting, the demand is not there and Kerem Shalom is not using close to its full capacity for fuel.

There are also no limits imposed by Israel on how much Gaza can export. Really.

After Hamas took over Gaza, Israel decided not to import goods from Gaza anymore - for good reason. Israel also limits exports to PA administered areas before the peace process gets moving again. But if Gazans can find markets in Europe and the US and the Arab world for goods, Israel is not stopping them at all. On the contrary, Israel is helping Gaza farmers export goods. 

There have been some limited attempts to export furniture, clothing and other goods from Gaza. Right now Gaza farmers and manufacturers are dependent on Israeli exporters and must follow international rules for exports, so there are some regulatory hurdles that must be overcome, just as with any exporter. But there is no practical limit on how much Gaza can export. (Recently, Gaza exported potatoes to Jordan, but Jordan does not want them to protect its own domestic market.)

Yes, Israel has a naval blockade on Gaza, and the laws of a legal blockade is that there can be no distinction between types of ships allowed. If Israel wants to block Gaza from getting weapons - and there have been attempts to ship large amounts of weapons to Gaza by sea - then Israel must also ban commercial ships. That's the way it is, and it cannot be changed without allowing Francops andKarine-A's filled with weapons to be sent to Gaza.

But Gaza does not need to import goods from the sea - because Kerem Shalom is large enough to handle all of Gaza's needs, even if the current construction material limits are lifted.

Every single time an NGO or government calls for Israel to "lift the blockade," they are ignoring the facts.

VERY disturbing pictures of Palestinian life under Israeli 'Occupation'

Summer Scenes From Concentration Camp Gaza; Qadisiyah resort near Rafah:

General view, note Zionist colored water

Razzle-Dazzle paving as form of torture

More Zionist walls and fences

Inside. Note lack of food

Oppressed Palestinians forced to swim with clothes on

Palestinian forced to dive into vat of the chemical dihydrogen-monoxide to evade bullets

The “Dolphin” resort near Gaza city:

Waterboarding

More waterboarding. Look at this poor child’s face of agony!

What Zionist torture contraption is this?

The ground is so polluted, mutant hens are roaming the streets

Note the heavy iron chains

More mutant animal, which Palestinians have to feed what little food they themselves have

And now you know.

ELDER OF ZIYON: Poor Gazans suffering from a glut of consumer goods

Last night I noted that the price for construction materials in Gaza have gone way down, mostly from increased imports through Kerem Shalom.

Now, we are learning that pretty much everything else in Gaza is cheap as well.

Goods that are selling at a discount in Gaza now include chocolate, nuts, beans, meat and both Feta and Bulgarian(!) cheeses.

The reason seems to be because the Egyptian pound has lost so much value so smuggled goods have become cheaper.

Keep in mind, though, that these price discounts are even after the recent Egyptian crackdown on smuggling tunnels.

Here are recent photos, all from this year, of the Saka supermarket in Gaza:

In other "siege" news, recently Israel allowed Gaza factories to export furniture to Egypt via Kerem Shalom.

And Egypt closed their border to Gaza for the third consecutive day.

Where was this picture taken?

Hamas urges PalArabs to vacation in Gaza

From Ma'an:

Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh on Monday urged Palestinians to spend their summer holiday in the Gaza Strip.

"I call upon our people in the West Bank, Jerusalem, and the 1948 territories to visit the Gaza Strip and spend happy days with their relatives and brothers during the summer on the beach," Haniyeh told Ma'an while taking a break from jogging along the beach in Gaza City.

"Gaza is safe and stable, and it is a meeting point for national unity," Haniyeh said.

"From the bottom of my heart I say that there is no need for touristic normalization with the Israeli occupation. There is no need for our people to go to Israeli beaches in occupied Palestine. I hereby tell them to come to Gaza which will be happy with their presence."

Here are photos of Haniyeh's jog along the street adjacent to the beach.

Doesn't it look relaxing? You, with only your bodyguards, as everyone else makes themselves scarce.

No pesky women for you to look at during your beach jog.

It's a dream vacation!

By the way, this isn't the first time that Gaza tried to attract vacationers. This video, apparently not meant to be ironic, was made in 2011:

Join the Gaza Marathon in 2013

Here are your tax dollars at work again. UNRWA has released this slick video promoting the Gaza Marathon, which is to take place on April 10 in Gaza. I have not been able to confirm rumors that Hamas will use rocket launchers to incentivize people to run faster. If they're malnourished, how are all these kids able to run the Marathon? And by the way, if Gaza is 'impoverished' and 'starving,' why do there seem to be so many activities going on? Will the New York Times send Jodi Rudoren to cover it?

Egypt is also pushing "forced consumerism" on Gaza!

Right as Al Monitor published a truly absurd anti-Israel screed blaming Israel for providing Gazan merchants with high-quality Israeli goods that some Gazans cannot afford, Palestine Times published a photo essay of a new "mall" in Rafah.

I wouldn't call it a mall; it seems more like a well-=stocked warehouse store where smuggled Egyptian goods are sold to Gazans. I couldn't find a single Hebrew word on any of the many, many goods pictured.

The goods being sold seem to be the same types of things sold at other Gaza stores that are sourced in Israel - candy and cosmetics and packaged food.

So is Egypt forcing Gazans in Rafah to buy consumer goods from them? Are Egyptians profiting from their "occupation" of Rafah? (Since the definition of "occupation" means, in the Israel-haters' minds, "enforcing a border with Gaza....", then Egypt is an illegal occupier of Gaza as well.)
Ah,  I forgot the first two rules of journalism in the territories:
Israel is always guilty, and only Israel is guilty.

Latest horror: Israel provides too many high quality goods to Gaza!

First, everyone used to complain about that "siege" that Israel supposedly had on Gaza? And how somehow Gazans managed to still get lots of consumer items anyway? And how the media tried to spin it?

Then they moved the goalposts, saying that the humanitarian crisis in Gaza that had been a media memesince at least 1993 was not really a humanitarian crisis per se, but more a crisis of "dignity."

Now that Gaza has far more consumer goods, exports are going up dramatically and the tunnel trade has been hurting because of the amount of aid coming from Israel, the Israel-haters need to find another theme - another reason to hate Israel. After all, we all know Israel is evil, so they must be guilty of something.

Al Monitor uncovers the latest nefarious Israeli crime:

Walking into a supermarket in Gaza might come as a great surprise for a person visiting the coastal enclave for the first time. At first glance,the visitor would be amazed by the level to which the shelves are packed with all kinds of products, ranging from basic food supplies to expensive chocolates and Coca-Cola. A father pushing a heaped stroller, or a toddler restlessly pulling her mother's hand and pointing at a lollipop, are scenes one is likely to encounter.

A closer look into the shelves, however, reveals a paradox that finds a manifestation in almost every aspect of life in Gaza. On the surface, everyone seems to be normally going about their 

daily

 lives, but even purchasing behaviors are controlled by Israel. The Israeli government brags about the truckloads it allows into the Strip through the Karem Abu Salem commercial crossing point, but it always forgets, deliberately or not, to mention that the products that enter the Strip through this very crossing are mostly marked with 729, the made-in-Israel barcode.

First-time visitors are usually lured by this façade of normalcy. Many wonder how a territory under siege can have all that it has, and the supermarket example is often cited to prove that the blockade is not as bad as is often publicized in the media.

This simplistic view of the terms "siege" and "occupation" make it necessary to clear out some of the common misrepresentations of what it means to force a population of 1.6 million to live under a military siege and occupation for more than five and sixty years respectively.

First, it is important to note that life under siege does not mean that the population in question is necessarily starving. However, it necessarily means that this population constitutes a huge consumer market to its jailer — Israel in this case.

The Palestinian people in Gaza are forced to import and buy Israeli goods. With Israel's restrictions on local production and its more-than-once bombardment of Palestinian factories, it has become almost impossible for the besieged population to use available resources for local production.

Prior to Israel's deadly assault on the Turkish aid flotilla in late May 2010, Israeli products barely reached the Strip. But after a massive wave of criticism that was hailed on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, he vowed to "ease" the blockade. Netanyahu fulfilled his promises. What followed was a tremendous inflow of Israeli goods that continues to be pumped in to this day.

The problem associated with consuming the goods of the occupying authority has two faces at least. Israeli products are high-priced, and, with few alternatives in place, Palestinians are forced to pay more for products that could be much cheaper if produced locally....

This means that 38.8% of Gazan people cannot afford the prices charged for the goods. [Yes, the author, a student of Business Administration in Gaza, claims that people classified as "poor" in Gaza cannot afford Coke. - EoZ] For them, the siege is more than whether the supermarket shelves are crammed; it is the fact that it makes them poor and causes difficult life conditions.

Due to the higher quality of Israel's exports to Gaza, combined with restrictions on domestic production, local businesses can hardly compete and rapidly lose market share to their Israeli counterparts. With limited amounts of money going for domestic production, Palestinian factory owners do little to enhance the quality of their output.

Notice the theme of Israel somehow restricting local Gaza businesses from producing locally sourced products. How exactly Israel controls local Gaza businesses is unexplained.

The more complex face of the problem lies in that Palestinians not only boost Israel's economy, but also make the occupation less costly. Israel, which denies the Palestinian people in the occupied territories the right to vote in the country's elections, controls what they eat and how they furnish their houses. Palestinians are made to fund the illegal settlements in the West Bank and deadly assaults such as that waged against Gaza in November, to name only two.

Gaza has a number of furniture factories that have, this season, exported goods. which means they are in business. Which means that they are selling in Gaza as well. Which means that the author is, simply, lying.

Living under siege does not result in a famine such as that in Somalia and other parts in Africa. It results in deteriorated living conditions and forced consumerism of the besieged population. 

Today's Gaza crisis: is now "forced consumerism." Not quite as sexy as "starvation" but when you hate Israel, you take what you can get.

This is similar to the laughable argument that Noam Sheizaf of 972 once made about a post of mine noting Israeli goods in Gaza markets, saying that Gazans were "forced" to buy them. I wondered if that included Chanukah coins, ice cream and snacks that were prominently displayed in these supermarkets, complete with Hebrew signage. Somehow, people who are "forced" to buy Israeli - whom Sheizaf claimed demanded that the world boycotts Israeli goods - couldn't find it in themselves to boycott non-essential snacks.

He never answered, of course.

By the way, outside of the flooding, nothing is stopping the tunnel trade from resuming and bringing quality, low cost Egyptian goods into Gaza to tap that huge market of people who cannot afford the expensive Israeli items. The free market is a powerful force, and the tunnel trade proved that Gazans can get what they want despite Israeli restrictions.

The entire article is a jumbled set of pseudo-facts intended to push the "Israel is bad" theme, without making a coherent argument. Of course, the fact that Gaza is run by a government sworn to utterly destroy Israel remains unmentioned in this nonsensical screed demanding, well, I'm not sure what. Cheaper potato chips? Unlimited imports and exports through Israel without any charge?

Egypt, which shares a border with Gaza, is also remarkably absent in this article.

And no wonder. The writer is also a contributor to Electronic Intifada, where truth is a far lower priority than anti-Israel propaganda.

Here are some disturbing photos of 'Palestinian' life under Israeli occupation. The photos speak for themselves.

Did Anybody Say ‘The Children of Gaza?’ By: Yori Yanover

 It's a runaway hit twit right now is this one:

“Hamas Bumper Stickers: Baby Suicide bomber on board.”

And a joke that’s getting old already goes: Two Palestinian mothers watch their children playing and one of them sighs and says, “They blow up so fast.”

The image I picked this morning is of Arab children visiting what looks like a makeshift amusement park in the Rafah refugee camp in the southern part of the Gaza Strip last summer, during the Eid el-Fitr holiday (marking the end of the month-long fast of Ramadan).

I can understand kids playing with toy guns (although in Gaza they’re not always the toy kind). If a child is surrounded with nothing but war talk and shaheed (martyr)n talk all day long, he’s not going to be playing with a toy microscope.

What I can’t understand is how someone sees these children playing and figures, this is a good time to shoot rockets at Israeli civilians across the border, so that one thing would lead to another and in the end, a few weeks down the road, these very children’s images would be plastered across the world media, carried by their mourning fathers, torn up and bleeding.

I think all of us here, in the tiny space between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea need urgent psychiatric care, but if I were the psychiatric nurse doing triage for the worst cases, I would definitely send all my psychiatrists to Gaza first.

It makes no sense. It doesn’t happen anywhere else in the world. A population under serious confinement, left to its own devices, with issues of poverty and housing and unemployment – and with money pouring in to help (just two weeks ago the Emir of Qatar came by to deliver half a billion dollars in aid), and all they end up doing is dragging Israel into yet another massive attack to stop the rocket fire.

Compulsory therapy, that’s what I’m for. A couch on every block, from Erez to Rafah. You have to attend one individual and one group session a week, or a cop will stop you, check your therapy papers and send you to therapy prison.

Or just re-occupy the place and re-integrate it into civilized society, taking out in the process the 10 thousand or so seriously mentally ill Hamas and Jihad and Salafi zealots. It don’t look like the “disengagement” that ruined the lives of thousands of Jewish ex-settlers has done anyone in Gaza much good, either.

Think of the children.

Palatial West Bank homes cost Palestinians greatly

Subhi Mustafa spent 35 years abroad, including a decade in the United States, but now that he has built his dream home in his West Bank village, he isn’t planning on going anywhere else.

He's one of a group of Palestinians who have spent years working overseas before returning home to small villages like Mazraa al-Sharqiya and rewarding themselves with their ideal luxury home.

“I left my village and lived with the pain of exile so that I could achieve a single goal -- to build a beautiful home in my village for me, my children and grandchildren,” says 60-year-old Mustafa.

“I’ve succeeded in doing that, and so I’m never going to leave again.”

Mustafa’s dream home doesn’t exactly blend in with the traditional houses in Mazraa al-Sharqiya, northeast of the city of Ramallah.

It’s 450 square meters (4,800 square feet) in size, and has a large courtyard in front that Mustafa says is intended to accommodate his grandchildren.

“There is a bit of competition between the former expatriates when it comes to building houses,” he admits.

“But I prefer to compete inside the house, rather than outside it.”

Mustafa says he decided to decorate and furnish it in an “American style.”

“I wanted everything to be American-style so my children and grandchildren who live there will be comfortable when they come to visit.”

A house like Mustafa's doesn’t come cheap.

“That cost more than $400,000,” he says, pointing to one house in the village.

“That one was $600,000, and that house cost about one million dollars in total. All of them belong to expatriates who worked in the United States.”

Mustafa began building his house when he returned to his village eight years ago.

“From the time that I left the village, I decided I would work just for this house and that I would come back once and for all from the United States,” he explains.

Competing to build a better house

Mustafa spent decades overseas: first 25 years in Peru, then another 10 years in Miami, before earning enough money to come home -- aged 53 -- and start construction on his dream house.

He’s not alone.

In Mazraa al-Sharqiya, only around 5,000 of the village’s 12,000 residents actually live in the West Bank. The rest are working overseas, most of them in the US.

Rafae Hamida, president of a local village charity, estimates that 67 percent of the village currently lives in either the U.S., Peru or Brazil.

“And every one of them wants to build a house that’s better than the next,” he says.

Damin Awad, 59, is another village resident who is living overseas – he’s the head of the Islamic Society in Peru. He’s lived in Peru for 44 years, but after a recent visit to Mazraa al-Sharqiya, he began weighing a permanent return and the prospect of building a home for him and his family.

He admits that competition between expatriates over who can build the best house has driven some to return and participate, but points out that many Palestinians decided to come home for fear of losing their residency rights or to try to reclaim those rights.

For years, Palestinians living in the occupied West Bank were compelled to periodically renew their residency permits with the Israeli authorities, and those who travelled overseas for long periods risked having their residency rights revoked if they failed to do so.

While the practice of revoking West Bank residency was stopped in 1994 after the Oslo Accords came into force, it is still valid for those Palestinians living in annexed east Jerusalem.

“It’s true that there’s building competition between returning expatriates,” Awad tells AFP.

“But there is also the real problem of Palestinians overseas losing their nationality and now trying to recover it, and that's more important than the house.”

But, he adds, “the general idea of each Palestinian who goes abroad is to get enough money to come back and build a beautiful home for him and his children.”

The phenomenon is not limited to Mazraa al-Sharqiya, with the Palestinian ministry of local government saying they’ve observed similar competition in other villages and towns across the West Bank.

The houses are often distinctive, giant homes that far exceed the regular size of Palestinian houses, the facades covered with stone and adorned with huge pillars. In some cases they look more like fairy tale palaces than regular homes.

Mohamed al-Qarut, an adviser at the ministry of local environment, says the proliferation of luxury homes built by returning Palestinians has both social and psychological dimensions.

“Expatriates who have been apart from their society for many years come back and reconcile with their society by building something beautiful and distinctive,” he says.

“People build these homes for three reasons: first because of the needs caused by the burgeoning population; second, because construction is a safe investment and third, because of the desire of expatriates who have lived overseas for many years to put their money in something that looks special and distinct.”

How Many Millionaires Live in the "Impoverished" Gaza Strip? by Khaled Abu Toameh

If the Egyptian army succeeds in demolishing the underground smuggling tunnels that keep Hamas running, it could mark the end of the Islamists' rule over the Gaza Strip. But if Egypt's new president, Mohamed Morsi and the Muslim Brotherhood tie the hands of the Egyptian army's generals and keep them from completing the mission, Hamas will become even stronger and wealthier.

The world often thinks of the Gaza Strip, home to 1.4 million Palestinians, as one of the poorest places on earth, where people live in misery and squalor.

But according to an investigative report published in the pan-Arab newspaper Asharq Al-Awsat, there are at least 600 millionaires living in the Gaza Strip. The newspaper report also refutes the claim that the Gaza Strip has been facing a humanitarian crisis because of an Israeli blockade.

Mohammed Dahlan, the former Palestinian Authority security commander of the Gaza Strip, further said last week that Hamas was the only party that was laying siege to the Gaza Strip; that it is Hamas, and not Israel or Egypt, that is strangling and punishing the people there.

The Palestinian millionaires, according to the report, have made their wealth thanks to the hundreds of underground tunnels along the border between the Gaza Strip and Egypt.

Informed Palestinian sources revealed that every day, in addition to weapons, thousands of tons of fuel, medicine, various types of merchandise, vehicles, electrical appliances, drugs, medicine and cigarettes are smuggled into the Gaza Strip through more than 400 tunnels. A former Sudanese government official who visited the Gaza Strip lately was quoted as saying that he found basic goods that were not available in Sudan. Almost all the tunnels are controlled by the Hamas government, which has established a special commission to oversee the smuggling business, which makes the Hamas government the biggest benefactor of the smuggling industry.

Palestinians estimate that 25% of the Hamas government's budget comes from taxes imposed on the owners of the underground tunnels.

For example, Hamas has imposed a 25% tax and a $2000 fee on every car that is smuggled into the Gaza Strip. Hamas also charges $15 dollars for each ton of cement, eight cents for a pack of cigarettes and 50 cents for each liter of fuel smuggled through the tunnels.

For Hamas, the Palestinian sources said, the tunnels are a matter of life or death.

Now, however, Hamas is facing a huge crisis as the Egyptian authorities plan to regain control over Sinai in the aftermath of the recent killing of 16 Egyptian border guards by unidentified terrorists.

The Egyptian army appears to be determined to destroy the underground tunnels out of fear that they are being used to smuggle not only goods and fuel, but also Islamist terrorists who pose a threat to Egypt's national security.

At this stage, however, it is not clear whether Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood President, Mohamed Morsi, would allow his army to cut off one of Hamas's main sources of income. Morsi's policy thus far has been to embrace and strengthen Hamas at the expense of the Western-backed Palestinian Authority in the West Bank.

If the Egyptian army succeeds in its anti-terror security crackdown in Sinai, including the demolition of all the underground tunnels that keep Hamas running, it could mark the beginning of the end of the Islamist movement's rule over the Gaza Strip. But if Morsi and the Muslim Brotherhood tie the hands of their generals and prevent them from completing the mission, Hamas will become even stronger and wealthier.

Photos: Ramadan in Gaza, 2012 This year's edition of Starving Gazan photos

Postcards from Hell – The Face of Gaza’s Humanitarian Crisis By: Yori Yanover

An aerial view of Gaza City.
Photo Credit: Sun Radio

“Gaza is the largest Palestinian city, roughly 500,000 in the metro area, out of 850.000 altogether in the province of Gaza. In 2009 the total population of the Gaza Strip was estimated in 2009 at 1,600,000.”

We Google-translated the above from رحلة سياحية لغزة (Tourist Trip to Gaza), which is part of the Tourism section of a website belonging to a radio station named “Sun.” The section on Gaza encourages tourism to the city which has been associated in popular public opinion with images of starving refugees huddled in shacks under daily Zionist air raids.

Sun is a regular radio broadcast of the Arab minority in Israel since 2003. Its slogan is: “Free Radio, modern Radio.” It says it represents the generation that no longer accepts being second class citizens in Israel. It is open to liberals who dare to break all political or social taboos. It also works to challenge the institution of the state and at the same time to build bridges of understanding and co-existence between Jews and Arabs.

The “Visit Gaza” section is current, and offers stunning images of Gaza City, a beautiful and vivacious place that could easily compete with many Israeli beach towns, including my own gorgeous city of Netanya.

So, all we have left to do is to take you on a tour of Gaza, and for the fun of it, we’ll add to these fabulous images quotes from two sources about conditions in this lovely city by the sea, UNRWA and the PA. In the end there’s a video you don’t want to miss. Enjoy!

As the Gaza blockade moves into its fifth year, a new report by the UN’s agency for Palestine refugees, UNRWA, says broad unemployment in the second half of 2010 reached 45.2 per cent, one of the highest in the world. The report released today, finds that real wages continued to decline under the weight of persistently high unemployment, falling 34.5 per cent since the first half of 2006. (UNRWA: Gaza blockade anniversary report)

The report concludes that 90% of Gaza water is unfit to drink. The reasons behind this deteriorating situation, the writer of the report believes, are the racist policies of occupation, the latest war on Gaza , the siege, and the division and its impact on society and education, which resulted in 45% of unemployed graduates. (Gaza Under Attack, Refugees Deteriorating Conditions)

The Refugees’ Affairs Department of the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) published a report detailing the conditions of Palestinian refugees, living in the Gaza Strip. The report compares the conditions of refugees in 2012 and 2006. The report writer, Ala’a Abu-Diaa, states that refugees’ conditions are deteriorating, in relation to housing and lands’ price, which doubled in the last five years. The rate of exports decreased 80% compared to the pre-siege period. Gazans found refuge, the report continues, in tunnels linking Gaza with Egypt. (Gaza Under Attack, Refugees Deteriorating Conditions)

The UNRWA report finds that the private sector was particularly badly hit compared to the government sector. In the second half of 2010 businesses shed over 8,000 jobs, a decline in employment of nearly 8 per cent relative to the first half of the year. By contrast, the Hamas-dominated public sector grew by nearly 3 per cent during the same period. (UNRWA: Gaza blockade anniversary report)

Human rights activists have criticized the international community for its silence on the flagging Gaza economy that has been shattered by the siege and the 22-day Israeli assault on the Gazans at the turn of 2009. (UNRWA: Gaza blockade anniversary report)

“These are disturbing trends,” said UNRWA spokesman Chris Gunness, “and the refugees, which make up two-thirds of Gaza’s 1.5 million population were the worst hit in the period covered in this report. (UNRWA: Gaza blockade anniversary report)

“Over a million refugees in Gaza live in hard conditions in several camps across the strip and are dependent on assistance provided by the UNRWA,” the report said. (UNRWA: Gaza blockade anniversary report)

The UN agency needs to build 100 schools and 10,000 housing units in addition to a number of health centers but these have been severely hampered by Israeli siege of the strip. (UNRWA: Gaza blockade anniversary report)

Successive UN human rights chiefs have slammed Israel’s illegal settlement plans, its Gaza blockade and the building of an apartheid wall across Palestinian territories in the occupied West Bank among other things. (UNRWA)

Refugees are still going through endless crisis, beginning with electricity and including fuel, which affect all walks of life in the besieged coastal enclave. The newly published report states that over 70% of refugees depend mainly on aid delivered by UNRWA.