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Comment and Opinion

Haaretz: Israel tightening Gaza blockade – but ball is in Hamas’s court, by Amos Harel

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The Israeli announcement on Monday of a reduction in the transfer of goods to and from the Gaza Strip reflects the frustration in the political and military leadership at the situation on the Gaza border. The various means tried by the defense establishment in response to the incendiary kites have not yielded any real results. Resorting to an economic sanction is meant to serve as a substitute for the growing demand in the cabinet to fire at the kite fliers, many of them children and teenagers. A strengthening of the blockade really is likely to spur the Hamas government in Gaza to change its approach – but at the moment there is no guarantee that things will progress in the direction that Israel wants.

Since the end of Operation Protective Edge, which began four years ago this week, Israel has refrained from closing the Kerem Shalom crossing, with the exception of one day when it was closed in response to the firing of rockets and another day, in April, after Palestinian rioters set fire to buildings on the Gazan side of the compound. The new decision does not apply to bringing in food and medicine. But it will affect the importation of goods into the Strip, first and foremost building materials, and will stop the meager export of agricultural products from Gaza to the outside world.

The Palestinians hit on the idea of using kites by chance, during a wave of demonstrations that began along the separation fence on March 30. When participation in the demonstrations dwindled, the incendiary kites and balloons became the main means of agitation. Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman said on Monday that to date about 28,000 dunams of natural forest and fields have been burned in the Gaza border communities, “an area the size of the city of Netanya or Rehovot.”

Read the full article at Haaretz.