Ministry of Transportation to impose restriction on traffic to Kerem Shalom
July 6, 2017
As previously reported (Hebrew), last year, the minister of transportation decided to prohibit the movement of trucks weighing over 12 tons on western Negev roads leading to Gaza’s sole commercial crossing, Kerem Shalom. The prohibition was set to apply from 7 a.m. to 9 p.m. and again from 3 p.m. to 5 p.m. The decision to restrict the movement of trucks was motivated by allegations regarding safety hazards for road users, primarily for school buses, in light of the traffic created around Kerem Shalom. At the time, Minister of Transportation Yisrael Katz said (Hebrew): “Keeping Negev schoolchildren and residents safe comes before the need to supply products to the Hamas regime in Gaza.”
The decision faced opposition from multiple sources, including local residents, the Council of Transporters and Carriers and the Ministry of Defense. Former Ministry of Defense Director General Maj. Gen. Dan Harel reportedly wrote to the ministry of transportation, expressing his own ministry’s “firm opposition” to the decision. Harel noted that “‘Kerem Shalom constitutes the sole axis for transporting goods to Gaza. Therefore, restricting movement on the roads to and from the crossing has far-reaching implications for the civilian and humanitarian needs that Israel is obligated to supply to the Strip.” Harel cautioned that such restrictions would limit vital provision of goods by more than 40 percent.
Following a petition against Katz’s decision, which Gisha requested to join as amicus curiae, the restrictions were put on hold. The ministry of transportation subsequently published a new plan (Hebrew), which merely reduced the duration of the restriction on truck traffic on the roads leading to Kerem Shalom from four hours to 2.5 hours (7:30 a.m. to 9 a.m. and 3:30 p.m. to 4:30 p.m.).
Once the new plan was made public, the ministry of transportation called any parties who believed they might be harmed by it to submit their positions before a decision was made. Gisha filed an objection on behalf of Gaza residents (Hebrew), arguing that a reduction in the hours during which movement of trucks is allowed would inevitably reduce the supply of essential, humanitarian goods to Gaza, and in turn, further undermine the already dire state of Gaza’s economy, breach undertakings made by the State of Israel, and harm public interest.
On July 5, 2017, after receiving the positions of various parties and despite the opposition voiced by Gisha and others, the ministry of transportation announced it had decided to accept the plan (Hebrew) and that it would go into effect within four months, once a large truck parking lot was built near Kerem Shalom Crossing. The language of the decision indicates that Gisha’s arguments about possible harm to Gaza residents had been taken into account, but was overridden by the need to respect local residents’ basic right to adequate safety on local roads. The decision also noted that Israel was still considering the possibility of opening an additional commercial crossing into Gaza at Erez Crossing, which is currently open only to pedestrians, but that immediate measures were required to address safety issues on local roads.
Gisha’s position is that the decision reached is wrong and unacceptable. Safety conditions on Negev roads are undoubtedly extremely lacking and must be improved, without delay. Gisha joins the call to improve road safety in order to protect the lives of local residents. However, the solution offered by the ministry of transportation prohibiting the movement of trucks carrying essential goods to Kerem Shalom during the morning and the afternoon will not solve the safety issues at hand. On the contrary, it may cause other, equally dangerous safety hazards during hours when the restriction does not apply.
Gisha believes other solutions could improve truck traffic on western Negev roads without interfering with the supply of goods to Gaza’s two million inhabitants, which is restricted as it is. One such solution could be to open Erez Crossing for commercial use or build another crossing along the border and upgrade the roads leading to it.
