Gaza Suffers Drop in Foreign Aid Over Syrian War...
GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip June 13, 2013 (AP)
A refugee from Syria recently opened a bakery here, drawing long lines of customers eager to taste meat and cheese pastries with the special flavors of Damascus — a rare bright spot in the long shadow that the Syrian civil war is casting over the Gaza Strip.
The conflict in Syria, some 300 kilometers (190 miles) away, is increasingly hurting Hamas-ruled Gaza financially, according to several officials in the Islamic militant group and in Islamic charities.
They say Iran, an ally of Syrian President Bashar Assad and a former major financial backer of Hamas, has reduced monthly cash transfers because Hamas refuses to side with the Syrian regime.
Islamic charities abroad that used to donate heavily to Gaza have been redirecting some of their aid to Syria, forcing local charities to scale back programs, aid officials said.
"All of Gaza is suffering from this," said Noha Zaki of Gaza City's Amal orphanage, home to 100 children. Zaki said donations to her charity are down by 50 percent.
In a further costly twist, more than 1,500 people fleeing the fighting in Syria, most with family ties to Gaza, have arrived in the coastal territory since last year, with hundreds more en route.
Bassel Shunar, co-owner of the new bakery — "Damashki" or "The Guy From Damascus" — had a soft landing. But aid officials say they have trouble finding jobs and homes for other newcomers in crowded, impoverished Gaza.
The Hamas finance minister, Ziad Zaza, acknowledged government money problems but blamed long-running Israeli restrictions at Gaza's borders. He denied his government receives money from Iran and claimed donations from abroad are still in the normal range of $5 million to $12 million a month.
Since its founding in 1987, Hamas has operated an aboveground political wing and a secret military wing. The Sunni Muslim movement, viewed as a terrorist group by the West, is secretive about its finances. It has released only partial information about the spending of the Gaza government it formed after overrunning the territory in 2007.
After the popular uprising against Assad erupted in March 2011, Hamas quickly felt the reverberations.
Hamas leaders in exile, including chief Khaled Mashaal, were based in Damascus then, but became increasingly uncomfortable with Assad's crackdown on Syria's majority Sunnis. Assad and key members of his regime are Alawites, or followers of an offshoot of Shiite Islam.
Assad, a longtime Hamas patron, demanded that the group show support for his regime. Instead, Mashaal and others left Damascus in early 2012. Mashaal moved to Qatar, part of the Saudi-led Gulf Arab bloc that opposes efforts by Shiite Iran to expand its influence.
Iran wasn't happy. But it didn't cut ties with Hamas, which is a key to Iran's regional ambitions, including setting up armed bridgeheads on Israel's borders.
As recently as November, after a bout of Israel-Gaza fighting, Mashaal thanked Iran for its support. Hamas hard-liner Mahmoud Zahar at that time challenged Gulf states to "compete with Iran in giving us weapons and money."
Iran has reduced Gaza funding in recent months, according to an Arab diplomat and three senior Hamas figures, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to brief reporters on the issue.
Their estimates of Iranian cash transfers before the cutbacks ranged from $120 million to $370 million a year....
(abcNews)
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