Israel eases up on blockade of Gaza

RAMALLAH // Israel yesterday allowed some previously banned goods into the Gaza Strip as international efforts to ease the Israeli blockade on the impoverished strip of land continued.

Britain had earlier denied that it was working on a proposal to convince Israel to relax the restrictions in return for decreased international pressure on Israel to establish an international committee of investigation into the raid on a flotilla of boats carrying humanitarian aid that resulted in the killing of nine activists. A British newspaper had reported on Tuesday that Israel was expected to accept the mooted British offer, allowing it to proceed with an internal investigation into the raid, rather than an international one, as demanded by Turkey and other countries.

"We don't know where the idea of a quid pro quo came from," said a statement from the British Embassy in Tel Aviv yesterday. Britain, the statement continued, remained committed to UN Security Council Resolution 1860, which was passed in the wake of Israel's war on Gaza last year and calls for a complete lifting of the Israeli blockade on Gaza in accordance with the 2005 Quartet-brokered Agreement on Movement and Access.

Nevertheless, diplomatic sources suggest that Britain, along with a number of European countries, is working behind the scenes on a proposal to be presented under the auspices of the EU to secure at least an easing of the blockade. Miguel Moratinos, the Spanish foreign minister, had on Saturday suggested that if the blockade was lifted, international monitors could inspect crossings into Gaza as well as ships bound for the Strip in order to allay Israeli security concerns.

Those concerns are apparently far-reaching. Among the goods Israel allowed into Gaza yesterday were canned drinks, juice, jam, spices, shaving cream, potato crisps, biscuits and sweets. These were previously banned ostensibly because they constituted a threat to the security of Israel, the stated reason Israel almost completely sealed the Gaza Strip to the outside world in 2007, after Hamas ousted Fatah-affiliated security forces to seize sole control over the coastal territory.

Israel had already significantly restricted the flow of goods to and from Gaza in the years before 2007, not least after Hamas won parliamentary elections in early 2006. The move to allow more goods into Gaza yesterday appears to be designed to defuse international pressure, but is unlikely to affect the desperate conditions faced by Gazans. The UN, which has repeatedly called for a complete lifting of the blockade, says the humanitarian crisis in Gaza is not caused by a lack of goods per se, but rather by the inability for a normal economy to function, thus depriving Gazans of the means to feed themselves.

Over 60 per cent of Gazans are food insecure, according to the UN's Development Programme (UNDP), as a direct result of the sanctions. Nearly 90 per cent of Gazans rely on international relief for their daily needs. Moreover, the ban on construction materials has left Gazans unable to rebuild homes and infrastructure, including the more than 3,000 houses destroyed during Israel's onslaught last year, or the power plant and sewage network, long in need of repair.

"The blockade is so damaging because it has created massive unemployment and destroyed the import/export sector, as well as the industrial base, in addition to causing shortages and inflation," a UNDP official said yesterday on condition of anonymity. "It has created a completely unnatural environment where people are insecure and effectively imprisoned." A partial lifting of the blockade in return for an end to international pressure to establish an independent commission of inquiry into the Freedom Flotilla raid would suit the Israeli government, however, said Yossi Alpher, an Israeli analyst.

"There may well be some receptivity to an idea that obviates the need for an international investigation by simply creating a new regime more acceptable to the international community. The Israeli government will see this as a chance to take some of the heat off." However, the Israeli government was likely to resist any attempt at securing a full end to the blockade, Mr Alpher said, and there was no sign to indicate that Israel had learnt "more than a tactical lesson".

"All we see so far is some readiness to relax the blockade. But it's not at all clear that that will be significant. The government is simply playing for time. There is nothing revolutionary in its decision-making style." Moreover, should the international community propose measures that allow Israel to continue, one way or another, its blockade on Gaza in violation of the AMA, Palestinians fear it would in effect simply provide Israel international cover for its blockade.

"The siege must be lifted completely," said Ahmed Yousef, the Hamas deputy foreign minister. He said the Hamas government in Gaza would study carefully any international proposals to lift the blockade, but any arrangement could not simply swap "one occupation for another". @Email:okarmi@thenational.ae