The Israeli occupation authority (IOA) has decided to allow entry of cement shipments to the Gaza Strip once again through the Karam Abu Salem commercial crossing after a hiatus for over a month.
Private sector companies in Gaza were informed by the Palestinian authorities that cement entry would resume as of Monday March 16 without UN observation.
Accordingly Gaza traders will be able to buy and sell cement with no restrictions.
The decision to allow in cement supplies is believed to have been taken as part of the last truce understandings — mediated by Egypt and UN — between the Palestinians in Gaza and the IOA.
In early February Israeli war minister Naftali Bennett decided to freeze entry of cement shipments and other commodities to the besieged enclave in response to what he called then daily Palestinian attacks on Israeli areas.
However the attacks on Israeli areas happened then after the Palestinians in Gaza accused the Israeli occupation army of deliberately opening floodgates of dams and flooding vast tracts of farmlands and roads in the east of Gaza causing considerable losses to the agricultural sector in particular.
