Faced With Egypt’s Wall, Gaza Tunnels Go On Sale
A news report by Falasteen Alyoom “فلسطين اليوم” reports that now one can buy a functioning Gaza tunnel for $20,000 instead of $150,000, the ongoing price. It seems that the laws of supply and demand work even in the Gaza smuggling business. Smuggling tunnels have become popular in the Gaza Strip after the Embargo of 2007 that limits the amounts of goods entering into Gaza. Cookies, chocolate bars, cheeses, shampoos, clothes, kitchen ware appliances, cement, medication and gasoline are all popular items smuggled into Gaza through the tunnels in the border area where the city of Rafah meets the Egyptian borders.
The lower price of the Rafah tunnels are a result of the increased rate of smuggling of Egyptian goods where the tunnel owners feared the consequences of new Egyptian wall. As a result the tunnel operators hired additional crews and ran the smuggling operation around the clock in an attempt to get as many goods into Gaza as possible before the Egyptian wall blocks them.
Abu Bassam a tunnel worker was quoted saying, “there are too many smuggled in Gaza now,” “the owners are are willing to take a price cut and sell”. According to Abu Bassam there are about 250 tunnels bringing goods into Gaza, the number used to be 1200 but due to the constant Israeli shelling and Egyptian using water and gas to shut down tunnels.
Abu Ahmad, a tunnel operator said he is selling his tunnel because competition lead to a decrease in returns. “Gaza business seek to buy from the cheapest supplier with no regard to workers safety.” Abu Ahmad confirmed that some tunnel owners are trying to escape the gloomy future as the Egyptian wall might make their business a thing of the past. “We used to pay tunnel workers 100 shekels”, “Now 40 shekels is the common wage”. According to Abu ahmad there was 10,000 tunnel workers and now there are only about a 1000 of them.
Would you buy a tunnel in Gaza?
Um, the Egyptians are using gas? Wouldn't that qualify as use of chemical weapons against civilians?
I suppose that would be correct