Israel has further tightened its blockade on the Gaza Strip, preventing gas and fuel deliveries through its only commercial crossing with the Palestinian besieged enclave after scores of kites carried firebombs across the border to burn Israeli farmland.
The defense ministry announced late on Monday that fuel and gas deliveries will be suspended. The fishing zone enforced by Israel off the Gaza Strip will also be further reduced from six nautical miles to three.
The goods crossing, known as Kerem Shalom, will remain open only for food and medicine on a case-by-case basis.
“In light of the continued terror efforts of Hamas, Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman has decided, after consulting with the chief of [military] staff, to close Kerem Shalom for the passage of fuel and gas until Sunday,” a statement said.
Even after Hamas, the Palestinian group that runs Gaza, agreed to a cease-fire late on Saturday, incendiary kites and balloons have continued to float from Gaza into Israel setting off damaging fires to farmlands.
Hamas has denounced Israel’s latest punitive measure.
Israel says it has no interest is engaging in another war with Hamas, but says it will no longer tolerate the flying of incendiary kites and balloons into Israel.
Israel’s latest measure comes following Israel’s initial closing of the Kerem Shalom Crossing on July 9, when they announced only items deemed “humanitarian” by Israeli authorities will be allowed to enter Gaza including food, hygiene and medical supplies, fuel, animal feed and livestock.
Since then, 55 percent of goods can no longer enter Gaza under the new restrictions, exacerbating already dire humanitarian conditions.
Hamas called the initial closing last week a “crime against humanity”.
The UN and Gisha, the Legal Centre for Freedom of Movement, called Israel’s latest measure an act of “collective punishment”.
“There is no other way of describing this measure other than collective punishment. Pretending to know what Gaza needs and trying to ‘manage the situation’ harkens back to earlier iterations of the closure, is morally depraved and constitutes a willful act of hubris in a volatile situation,” a spokesperson from Gisha said.
Palestinians in Gaza view the balloons and kites as legitimate resistance against Israel’s more than decade-long blockade, which has caused widespread economic hardship.
Egypt has also maintained the blockade with Israel over the strip, in an attempt to weaken Hamas.
A spokesman for Israel’s fire service said around 750 fires have burned some 2,600 hectares, estimating the damage at millions of shekels (hundreds of thousands of dollars or euros).
The tightening of the blockade comes after Saturday’s heaviest exchange of fire between Israel and Palestinian groups in Gaza since the 51-day Israeli military assault on Gaza in 2014.
Israel carried out air strikes partially in response to the months of fires started by the kite firebombs, but also over continuing protests and clashes along the Gaza border.
Israel hit dozens of sites in the Gaza Strip on Saturday, killing two Palestinian teenagers.
The same day Hamas said it launched rockets and mortars in response to the Israeli air strikes which wounded 30 Palestinians. Four Israelis were lightly wounded in the nearby Israeli city of Sderot.
The weekend’s violence came after months of near-weekly border demonstrations aimed in part to protest the Israeli-Egyptian blockade of Gaza. At least 137 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli fire since the protests began on March 30.