Israel resumes postal delivery of packages into Gaza after 5-month ban

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GAZA (Ma’an) -- Israeli Authorities decided on Sunday to resume postal service into the blockaded Gaza Strip, lifting a five-month ban on the entry of packages, an official for the Palestinian liaison told Ma’an.

The ban was imposed after Israeli authorities alleged that they found materials that could be used for military purposes in packages being delivered to the besieged coastal enclave.

In response to a request for comment, a spokesperson for the Coordination of Government Affairs in the Territories (COGAT), the group responsible for implementing the Israeli government’s policies in the occupied territory, confirmed on Monday the that the ban would be lifted, highlighting that deliveries of documents and letters had “continued as usual.”

“Following abuse of the postal services by the terror organization Hamas and multiple attempts to smuggle materials for terror purposes, including knives, drones, spy equipment, diving equipment, etc., it was decided to freeze the postal services for packages coming into the Gaza Strip,” their response read.

“In order to assist the civilian population of Gaza and after clarifying the severity of exploitation of the postal services, it was decided yesterday to renew the postal services for packages into the Gaza Strip. However, we will not allow this abuse of the postal service and we hope that the civilians will use it for the purposes for which it was intended, civilian purposes only.”

When the ban was put in place in July, Director of Public Relations and Media at the Hamas-run Ministry of Communications in Gaza Samir Hamto rejected Israel’s claims of finding equipment for military use.

“The occupation makes these claims in order to tighten the siege on the Gaza Strip,” he said, adding that the suspension would only harm the people of Gaza.

The majority of the more than 1.8 million Palestinians in the Gaza Strip are sealed inside the coastal enclave due to a near-decade long military blockade imposed by Israel and upheld by Egypt on the southern border.

Meanwhile, in September, the Palestinian Authority (PA) and Israel signed a memorandum of understanding aimed at improving postal services between Israel and the Fatah-controlled PA, which determined that international postal services between the occupied Palestinian territory and the rest of the world would be handled exclusively by the PA through the Allenby Bridge crossing between Jordan and the West Bank.