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Big_Bird
Joined: 31 Jan 2003
Location: Sometimes here sometimes there...
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 Posted: Wed Jan 21, 2009 7:40 pm Post subject: Smugglers back at work in tunnels beneath Gaza |
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Smugglers back at work in tunnels beneath Gaza
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Fuel and food still being brought in despite damage from Israeli bombing raids
Some Gazans are working to restart � or are continuing with � the smuggling of contraband under the Gaza-Egypt border, despite the hundreds of Israeli bombing raids which they admit have destroyed most of the tunnels that operated here until Operation Cast Lead began.
They say that highly prized diesel and petrol for fuel-starved Gaza is still flowing through improvised piping under the border as other operators begin to assess the damage and work on reconstructing tunnels filled in by precision F16 bombing.
As well as destroying or damaging hundreds of tunnels, the bombing has dramatised Israel's central war aim of persuading Egypt � with international help � to call a halt to arms smuggling under the Rafah border. While arms are presumed to have been brought through the network, many of the openly dug tunnels have supplied fuel, domestic goods and livestock, in what a UN report last year described as a "vital economic lifeline" to a Gaza under blockade.
The tunnel numbers grew rapidly after Israel imposed its closure of Gaza when Hamas seized control by force in the wake of a short but bloody civil war between it and its Fatah rivals culminated in the June 2007 collapse of their short-lived coalition. Hamas insists the tunnelling would stop if the crossing were reopened for commercial goods.
At one tunnel entrance yesterday a Daf tanker emblazoned with "Fares Petrol" was filling up with 19,000 litres of fuel from one of three storage tanks with a total capacity of 50,000 litres. The corrugated roof of the breeze-block "office" within the enclosed compound � containing a desk and satellite TV � was holed by shrapnel from a bomb which landed at the next door tunnel entrance during the Israeli offensive.
The main operator of the tunnel, "Abu Abdullah", who like several others along the border would not give his full name, said that his own tunnel had been hit by a bomb, which landed some 250 metres away, half way to the border. "Thank God it did not affect the tubes and we can still get the fuel through," he added.
A bearded Hamas activist, Abu Abdullah, 35, said his tunnel was used also to convey "cheese, motors, generators. Whatever you can think of to break the siege, we brought it in". He strongly denied importing weapons through the tunnel and said he intended to complete reconstruction of it within three weeks or a month to bring in other goods. "Even when the rockets were falling, we went on bringing the fuel in," he said.
One Rafah resident who refused to be named said he believed that Hamas had other, secret tunnels, for supplying the Islamic faction's military wing with weapons but did not know their location.
Like many operators of an estimated 400 tunnels before the Israeli offensive, he had paid a 10,000 shekel (�1,825) fee to the Hamas-run Rafah municipality � ostensibly to finance a regulation regime. He also supplied the municipality with fuel for its own vehicles. He said that a consortium of Egyptian and Palestinian investors had stumped up $90,000 (�63,700) to build the 25-metre deep tunnel and that profit margins were low, given the initial stake and that he employed 16 workers on the Palestinian side alone. Currently, he said, he pays 2.20 shekels a litre for petrol � which is initially smuggled into Egypt from Libya in huge 50,000-litre trucks � sells it for 3 shekels and that it sells at the pump for around 3.30 shekels a litre.
Like other operators along the border, he was sceptical that Egypt would halt the smuggling of civilian goods if it restarts because of its importance to the economy of northern Sinai. "The Egyptians are very interested in money. For us money comes second to breaking the siege. I am proud of doing this, to help the people of Gaza," he said. The door to another breeze-block building housing the tunnel entrance was padlocked and Abu Abdullah apologised that he could not show us inside because he was not carrying the key. But he said that he estimated that "40-50" tunnels along the border were still at least partly working despite heavy bombing which has clearly devastated streets of homes in the Rafah refugee camp, close to the border from which residents were first ordered to flee.
Elsewhere, two operating partners, "Abu Amjad" and "Mohammed", both 30, were using a small generator to haul sand and mud from the main shaft before assessing the full damage to the tunnel, mainly used for importing food products. "It cost us $90,000 to build so another $5,000 to repair it will not be so much," said Abu Amjad. Asked if he was not worried that it could be bombed again, he added: "It was dangerous before the war." Collapses were already costing about three workers' lives a week last year.
Some operators have given up. Abdul Majid Shaer, 20 said he and his three partners had sunk $20,000 each into a tunnel they were still building when the war started. He had financed his own stake from the $100 a day he had been earning as a tunnel worker. Now it was too badly damaged to continue. "We have no alternative," he added. |
Most of these tunnels are privately owned, and are basically what's keeping Gazans alive. Destroying them was supposed to have been one of the main objectives of the IDF. Fortunately for the Gazans, they don't seem to have done a great job of it.
Here's another article for those who find it interesting:
Under the border with Egypt, Gaza's smugglers return to work |
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ManintheMiddle
Joined: 20 Oct 2008
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| Posted: Wed Jan 21, 2009 8:59 pm Post subject: |
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Yes, and please do post another thread on this when you diligently determine that Hamas is smuggling in more weapons yet again from Iran, as I'm sure you want to be fair-minded in your reporting.  |
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caniff
Joined: 03 Feb 2004
Location: All over the map
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| Posted: Wed Jan 21, 2009 9:53 pm Post subject: |
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They should dig a tunnel to the West Bank so they can be one happy family and leave everyone else out of it.
I'm half-serious. Why not bridge the two Palestinian states via tunnel and call that the "One State Solution"? They'll then be free to create headaches for each other without Israeli 'persecution'.
Seems like a reasonable solution. [Dodging the Swear filter], I'd even chip in a few bucks to help remove their excuse for constantly whining and throwing their habitual temper tantrums (and rockets).
Sorry, Palestine. When you buy it (Hamas), you own it. And when you break it (Palestinian-held territory controlled by an intransigent Hamas), you also own it. Store policy.
Do you have your receipt? You claim to have received millions in aid, but there's no evidence of any transactions. Unfortunately, we may have to close your store credit account.
Now put down your pathetic banners and your guns and get a [Another Mod Edit]job. Stop spending all your time yammering about the infidels and your poor plight. Look in the mirror, you losers. |
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Jandar
Joined: 11 Jun 2008
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| Posted: Wed Jan 21, 2009 10:40 pm Post subject: |
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| Don't forget that they are enslaving children to dig those tunnels and smuggle those weapons. |
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TheUrbanMyth
Joined: 28 Jan 2003
Location: Retired
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| Posted: Wed Jan 21, 2009 11:03 pm Post subject: |
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| Jandar wrote: |
| Don't forget that they are enslaving children to dig those tunnels and smuggle those weapons. |
Link?
Israel is limited by concern for the Palestinian citizens in what it can do in response to the tunnels. For example Israel at one time considered flooding the tunnels, but abandoned the idea when it realized that this could contaminate Gaza's aquifer. |
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Big_Bird
Joined: 31 Jan 2003
Location: Sometimes here sometimes there...
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| Posted: Mon Feb 09, 2009 6:26 pm Post subject: |
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For anyone who finds this stuff interesting:
Inside the Gaza tunnels
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| They were one of Israel's key targets during its three-week assault on Gaza. But the relentless air strikes failed to destroy the hundreds of tunnels running under the border to Egypt. Rory McCarthy goes underground to watch the everyday smuggling of boxes of women's underwear, car parts and even goats |
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Big_Bird
Joined: 31 Jan 2003
Location: Sometimes here sometimes there...
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| Posted: Thu Feb 12, 2009 11:26 pm Post subject: |
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Digging For The Truth
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Lucky we were to have fled imminent death as more than fifteen F-16 rockets bombarded the tunnels area where we had lit a fire the previous night to drink tea and talk story about life in the tunnels. Many houses were partially destroyed due to the heavy bombardments, but no casualties were reported.
South of the Gaza Strip, a very strange phenomena is taking place. People are racing time, using primitive ways to get food and achieve a good life. The people in the Gaza Strip, the most densely populated area in the world, are forced to face death in order to attain life`s basic necessities. This is against all humanitarian laws, and the rights of these laws were stripped from the Gazans by Israel. Border crossings were closed as a tightened siege was imposed two years ago.
Consequently, a complete paralysis hit the agricultural, medical, economical, and all sectors of life. People were trapped in a large concentration camp called Gaza, and they are still, where no one is allowed to get in or to get out. Students are deprived from their education abroad. Three hundred patients died due to the inability to travel for treatment, while some others died due to lack of medicine altogether. There is no gas for heating, and power cuts are frequent. The Gazans were pushed to use alternatives to get life back after the Israelis robbed them of basic necessities. The alternatives were an amalgamation of fear, freedom, death, and life. They started to dig tunnels that linked Gaza with Egypt in order to bring what Israel had made taboo for the Palestinians.
In the sixties and seventies, some tunnels had already been excavated for the smuggling of jewelry and food, and this trade flourished when Hamas came into power in mid-2007. Now more than two thousand tunnels have been dug through the borders to reach Egypt, each varying from 100 to 1,200 meters. Thousands of people began to work as daily laborers in order to bring sweets, animals, flowers; basic things, for without these tunnels people would be starving and would have nothing. Ultimately, they are used to drag food into the Palestinian side because these people are trapped inside Gaza as the crossings are closed. These tunnels are their source of life. On the contrary, working in them automatically makes them an associate with tragedy, and it is a frequent visitor. It is a hazardous operation where more than one hundred out of these thousands of laborers died, and they are still dying.
After forty-five minutes night began to fall and we were not yet able to accomplish our mission, which was to discover the mysterious motives behind this labyrinth of tunnels. Finally we managed to meet Abu Rani, a twenty-one year old and the breadwinner of his family of eleven. His house was bombed during the war and he has no source of income. He stopped working in the tunnels out of fear, as they had taken the life of both his father and his brother. `I became crazy!` he said. `I have nothing but God to help me.`
In the background, there was a busy area in which bulldozers were digging back the tunnels that were destroyed by the Israelis F-16s that had raided thousands of tons of explosions on the area. The bombing not only resulted in the destruction of these tunnels, but many houses neighboring them. Many people were gathered at sunset to watch the bulldozer, and we learned that one of the tunnels had just collapsed on five individuals. We saw the red lights flashing as the sirens roared past us. After three hours and many attempts, the paramedics were fortunately able to retrieve all of the victims of the collapse alive. However, they were in critical condition due to being buried beneath twenty-three meters of sand and nearly suffocating.
It then took thirty minutes for Abu Rani to drive us to meet Abu Jehad. He gave us valuable information about how the tunnels were built and how food was brought over from Egypt. According to Abu Jehad, building a tunnel takes two to four months in which more than ten people work for more than ten hours a day in the digging process. The laborers dig using shovels and hammers, and each of them risks his life for one hundred dollars a day.
`These tunnels are deadly and dangerous, but we have no choice but to work in them. We are jobless, and it`s good money. I used to work in Israel years ago, but was kicked out and turned jobless because I was Palestinian,` Abu Jehad explained. `Two years ago I turned to work in these tunnels, despite not agreeing with them. I know it is a journey towards death to bring food, but we have to remain alive as Israel deprives us the basics of life. Within the war, Israel destroyed most of these tunnels and did not allow everything in the Gaza Strip, but here we are trying to dig again in order to bring life.`
Israel claims that these tunnels were used for the smuggling of weapons, but what we have documented and witnessed is that most of the tunnels are being used for food and necessities prevented to go through Israeli crossings and into Gaza. A few Palestinian militants do smuggle light weapons, however these light weapons cannot stand against Israeli military high-tech.
Access to food, freedom of movement, and a just life is being guaranteed by all humanitarian charters. Collective punishment is prohibited and sometimes can be considered as a war crime when it comes to depriving people of food. Israel violated these charters flagrantly as amnesty international human rights watch, and all organizations working in occupied Palestine said. Israel defends itself by saying that they allow everything into Gaza, however, hunger still prevails as Israel only allows limited food supply into the Gaza Strip. Less than one hundred vans are permitted, despite that it was seven hundred before the siege. At the end of the day, what Israel says goes, and the Palestinians are still suffering.
Photos: http://picasaweb.google.com/sameh.habeeb/
TunnelsPostWarSeekingForFoiodAgain#
Sameh A. Habeeb, B.A.
Photojournalist & Peace Activist
Humanitarian, Child Relief Worker
Gaza Strip, Palestine
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Big_Bird
Joined: 31 Jan 2003
Location: Sometimes here sometimes there...
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| Posted: Mon Dec 14, 2009 7:41 pm Post subject: |
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Boom in illicit trade in motorbikes, dismantled in Egypt and smuggled into Gaza, brings deadly consequences
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t is all the more precious these days. After an influx of bikes through the deep underground passages between Gaza and Egypt resulted in carnage on the roads by young, untrained riders, the Hamas government ordered the imports to stop.
Mahmoud, 18, is one reason why. He has no licence and no helmet, but his Chinese-made bike makes him feel good. "It is what all the young men want," he says. "It is much better than driving a car."
The bikes are dismantled in Egypt and transported through the tunnels in pieces, in view of Egyptian border guards and Israeli drones, to be reassembled in workshops in the besieged Palestinian territory.
But the trade has come at a price.
According to Khalil Shahin, economic director of the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR), a 25% increase in the number of motorcycles on Gaza's streets over the past seven months has caused at least 160 deaths and about 1,000 injuries.
Under pressure from the PCHR, the Hamas government has taken action. Motorbikes were banned along the busy coast road at weekends during the summer. Three driving schools for motorcyclists were opened, and licences and tax � costing 1,300 shekels (�210) a year � are now mandatory. |
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A handsome man with a short beard and a broad smile, he is one of 17 partners who have invested in the new tunnel. "We are just mediators," he explains. "We have dealers in Egypt making requests to transport goods, and people in Gaza also making orders. You can order anything you need."
Tunnel collisions are not the only hazard. The well leading underground was bombed by the Israelis three months ago; two of Abu Rawhai's workers in the tunnel suffocated to death. Abu Rawhai paid each family 40,000 shekels (�6,500) compensation, and then set about building a new well a few metres away.
He gestures to a crane a short distance away on the other side of the border, and complains that the Egyptians are building a barrier deep underground to stop smuggling. His tunnel is 13 metres deep; the Egyptian barrier is reported to extend 30 metres underground. "Everything will be over if this wall is built," he says.
Are the tunnels good for Gaza? "Yes and no," he says. "They are breaking the siege, but it's dangerous work. The men are afraid whether they will come back up."
But Ismail, 19, barefoot with a red and white keffiyeh round his head, who emerges amid the steamy air that rises through the tunnel well after fixing a collapse, disagrees. "Of course I'm not scared," he says. "We are lions. And there is no work elsewhere."
Khalil Shahin of the PCHR estimates that 40-50,000 Gazans are working in or around the tunnel economy, including transportation and warehousing. He adds that a small proportion � "not more than 5,000" � are children. "Tunnel workers need to be slim and agile. Children make good workers underground."
Since the Israeli blockade on nearly all goods in and out of Gaza, the tunnels have become "a lifeline, crucial to breaking the siege and ensuring basic life can continue", says Pelham.
But they are also having a political consequence in tying Gaza's economy more firmly to Egypt and further distancing it from the West Bank � a result that some Palestinian leaders say is a deliberate Israeli tactic to divide and weaken the Palestinians. |
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Summer Wine
Joined: 20 Mar 2005
Location: Next to a River
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| Posted: Wed Dec 16, 2009 12:13 am Post subject: |
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Even if the International community placed border patrol units and opened and counted every truck that went through, the tunnels would survive.
Because its hard to justify bringing in 82mm mortars into a country/region that states it wants to wipe israel of the map.
If the egyptians really thought the border could be opened, they would do so. |
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