Gaza Strip Crossings: A Tool of the Occupying Power to Spread a New Form of Corruption and Extortion
AMAN calls for a unified committee for coordinations and local and international oversight mechanisms
Gaza- The Coalition for Accountability and Integrity (AMAN) held a virtual session via Zoom to discuss the research paper entitled, “Manifestations of corruption associated with the occupation’s administration of the crossings of Gaza Strip during the genocidal war”, with the aim of discussing the manifestations of structural and institutional corruption in the occupation’s management of the crossings during the war, which created fertile grounds for corrupt practices that lack integrity.
Wa’el Ba’lousha, the director of AMAN office in Gaza, opened the session explaining that it aimed at discussing the complex system that led to the emergence of new forms of corruption that are detrimental to the local economy, in addition to presenting the findings and recommendations.
Ba’lousha pointed out that the Israeli occupation exploited the Gaza Strip crossings during the genocidal war as a tool for collective punishment and direct control, leading to serious violations of international humanitarian law. The paper also confirmed that the management of the crossings involved practices tainted by suspected administrative and ethical corruption, compounded by dismantling the previous institutional system that organized the entry of aid, goods, and the movement of individuals.
Crossings as a tool for political and economic extortion
Researcher Dr. Talal Abu Rakbeh reviewed the paper's key findings, explaining that the Israeli occupation exploited its full control over Gaza crossings as a tool for collective punishment within the context of systematic genocide. It built a complex system lacking transparency and dominated by exploitation and structural corruption, enabling it to control the entry of aid, goods, and the movement of individuals. It used humanitarian needs like medicine, food, and fuel as a card for political and economic extortion, which deepened the crises of the population and created a distortion in the distribution of resources.
The paper indicated that the occupation deliberately stripped Palestinian institutions of any effective role in managing the crossings, reinforcing a state of institutional uncertainty and weakening the ability of national entities to build good governance based on integrity and transparency. This situation created an irreparable administrative model, granting the occupation the ability to control the fate of the population through extortionary tools that violate international and humanitarian law.
International strategies to alleviate occupation’s corruption in crossings management
The paper's recommendations emphasized that confronting Israeli corrupt practices in managing Gaza crossings requires organized international action. This should begin with forming a permanent monitoring mechanism under the supervision of the United Nations or the International Committee of the Red Cross to follow up work progress and ensure that the crossings are not used as a tool for political extortion or collective punishment. It also recommended activating a neutral mechanism for auditing the entry of aid and goods, publishing transparent quarterly reports on the volume of aid and the criteria for rejection or delay, in addition to documenting violations and referring them to the Human Rights Council and the International Criminal Court as crimes that violate the International Humanitarian Law.
A national plan to enhance transparency and accountability locally
At the local level, the recommendations called for preparing a comprehensive national plan to coordinate among official, civil, and private sector institutions, ensure the monitoring of the movement of goods and individuals through the crossings, and create an open database containing details about merchants and the goods allowed to enter. The recommendations also stressed activating the role of chambers of commerce, unions, and popular committees in documenting violations and preventing manipulation or monopoly, as well as launching digital platforms for reporting corruption and adopting binding codes of conduct for merchants and companies. These measures aim to build a national public opinion capable of confronting corruption and protecting the values of integrity and transparency in the face of Israeli pressure and control over the crossings.
The occupation is the main address of the corruption system in Gaza
Yusri Darwish, Chair of the Board of the General Union of Cultural Centers (GUCC), confirmed that the Israeli occupation spearheads the corruption system in Gaza, exploiting the conditions of war and genocide to target the entire Palestinian system, from municipalities to civil and tribal institutions, which allowed "scroungers" to practice corruption with impunity. He explained that the occupation created chaos in Gaza by controlling trade and crossings and selectively distributing privileges to merchants, with some local institutions participating in suspicious practices, including granting financial facilities to importers.
Darwish added that the entry of humanitarian aid was subjected to politicization and manipulation, as it was for a period exclusively channeled through the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), before Israel allowed its return through other channels under Palestinian, international, and global pressure. Darwish concluded that what has been revealed so far merely represents the “tip of the iceberg”, and that ending the war and allowing access to information will reveal the scale of violations that will be recorded in a black "list of shame".
A database to monitor goods and a call to expand the corruption investigation
Meanwhile, Mamoun Basisso, a UN advisor for reconstruction in the Middle East, confirmed that since about a month, and in coordination with the UN, a comprehensive database is being prepared to monitor everything entering Gaza Strip through commercial crossings, whether from merchants' trucks or humanitarian aid. He indicated that this data will be issued in daily, weekly, and monthly reports, with part of it made public. Basisso considered this step to be progressing well and constitutes an important basis for monitoring the movement of goods.
In his intervention, Basisso stressed the many dimensions related to corruption, such as the claims about paying huge sums of money (which may reach US$ 10,000) for travel, or the mechanisms with which merchants work and move goods, in addition to ambiguous dimensions related to the West Bank and the Egyptian side. He pointed out that these issues require serious investigations to determine if they are just rumors or facts, emphasizing the need for courage to expand the scope of the research and expose sources of corruption from all parties, rather than focus on Gaza merchants alone, as there are influential parties involved in this system as well.
The occupation extorted hundreds of millions from Gaza merchants through the “coordination” fees
Merchant Riyad Al-Sawafiri confirmed that the Israeli occupation extorted hundreds of millions from Gaza merchants by controlling the crossings and imposing high "coordination" fees on trucks. According to him, during the four stages of the war, the coordination fees amounted to around US$805 million for the entry of around 34,000 trucks. Compared to what was paid before the war, the additional amount is US$707 million, which comprises the crux of corruption and extortion, committed with the participation of some merchants from both the Israeli and Egyptian sides.
Al-Sawafiri added that the highest rates of extortion occurred during the period from October to November 2024, when Israel stopped direct coordination with merchants and restricted it to relief institutions, leading to imposing exorbitant fees that sometimes reached 800,000 shekels per truck. Subsequently, the procedures of the humanitarian protocol partially helped reduce the pressure, but the process remained under the control of the occupation and its institutions.
The need to establish a unified committee for coordinations to alleviate corruption
Suheil Al-Saqqa, deputy chair of the Palestinian Contractors Union, asserted that the core of the crisis lies in the practices of the Israeli occupation, which did not suffice with the siege, but deliberately dismantled Palestinian official frameworks, such as the Crossings Authority, to create a state of chaos and rivalry among merchants. He explained that the coordinations, which were previously managed in an organized manner, have now turned into a tool in the hands of the occupation, which distributes them to "chosen individuals," thus promoting corruption and extortion.
Suheil indicated that this corruption was not restricted to the occupation, but extended to some international institutions, because of the overlapping interests with some local merchants, which provided room for the spread of bribes and abuse of power. He added that the occupation chooses greedy persons who seek financial gains and grants them privileges at the expense of the public interest, which led to exacerbating the crisis.
Within the context of proposing solutions, Al-Saqqa called for forming a unified committee for coordinations, that would act as a single transparent body to regulate the system. It would include representatives from the private sector and chambers of commerce, in cooperation with some humanitarian institutions, making it the sole entity authorized to submit truck manifests and requests to the occupation. He explained that this mechanism would restore discipline to the process, ensure transparency, and alleviate the spread of bribes and the "selling of coordinations" among merchants.
