The sources said Egyptian security forces, through nearly nightly raids
in Rafah and other communities along the border, have blocked more than $6
million from arriving to the Gaza Strip. In March 2010, they said,
authorities arrested 45 people on charges of smuggling, including one who had
carried $242,000 for the Hamas regime.
"Not too long ago, they [Hamas] would assign one person to carry
millions of dollars from Egypt to Gaza," the source said. "Now, they are
scared, and they divide the money among many smugglers."
For its part, Hamas has acknowledged the Egyptian operations, Middle East Newsline reported. The
Islamic regime has linked the Egyptian crackdown to Hamas's failure to pay
salaries to the 32,000 civil servants in the Gaza Strip in 2010.
"We are having difficulties in bringing in money because of the
siege, and this will not last long," Hamas Deputy Finance Minister Ismail
Mahfouz said. "The government has its own reserves, and it can make them
available. But it needs a way of getting them."
The sources, denying reports of a
Palestinian breach of the security barrier, said Egypt has also been
arresting suspected smugglers in the eastern Sinai Peninsula in what appears
to have been a successful effort to reduce the illegal trade with the Gaza
Strip.
Mahfouz said civil servants haven't been paid their full monthly
salaries for March and April. Mahfouz said Hamas required $16 million a
month to pay government salaries, which range from $700 to $1,100.
The security sources said the Egyptian crackdown was meant to end Hamas's
rejection of a reconciliation agreement with the rival Fatah movement. Egypt
has presented a plan that would enable the return of the Palestinian
Authority — expelled in 2007 — to the Gaza Strip.