MiddleEastEye <big><big> War on Gaza: Charity says Egypt intelligence-linked firm charging $5,000 [per truck] to get aid over border</big></big> January 30, 2024
Speaking on condition of anonymity, to avoid obstruction to relief effort, an international charity’s spokesman told Middle East Eye of being forced to pay a bribe of $5,000 per aid truck into Gaza, to a company linked to Egypt’s military General Intelligence Service (GIS). The spokesman said never in all its years of emergency work in wars, famines and earthquakes throughout the Middle East and Afghanistan, had the NGO been treated like this
by a state who is profiteering from the dispatch of humanitarian goods. It’s draining a lot of our resources...”
The charity said the money is being paid in the form of a “management fee” to a company affiliated with the Sons of Sinai, a [transportation, logistics,] construction and contracting firm owned by the Sinai businessman, Ibrahim al-Organi, and part of his Organi Group…
MiddleEastMonitor — February 6, 2024 <big><big>Ibrahim Al-Organi is the crossing broker and friend of Sisi’s son</big></big> This article supplies biographical and mega-business detail — including on Abnaa Sinai (Sons of Sinai) and Hala Tourism — on al-Organi’s rise from local anti-Mubarak leader in the North Sinai, organizing tribes into an intelligence and militia system, to pro-Sisi crony, conqueror of Rafah and central in the traffic of people and goods into and out of Gaza. Possibly an eye opener to anyone unfamiliar with how business is conducted in corrupt nations, especially where the military itself is THE major business owner. This is not necessarily unusual or even abnormal in many parts of the world.
A February 7, 2024 MEMRI article reported that following publication by the Lebanese Daily 'Al-Akhbar' on the Egyptian regime profiteering from the suffering of war via high taxes on goods (including aid) entering Gaza, and huge fees and bribes at the border on Gazans leaving, Egyptian authorities said the fees were to prevent Gazans immigrating to Egypt and to thwart "plans aimed at eliminating the Palestinian cause". Then, London-based daily Al-Quds Al-Arabi reported that the Egyptian security services contract with the Hala travel agency was ended due to outraged public response to the initial reports, and Hala’s Facebook page stated that it was not accepting new orders.
The MEMRI article also reported Al-Akhbar stating:
throughout the war, "food factories belonging to the Egyptian army worked intensively" to manufacture products that were sent to Gaza as humanitarian aid on behalf of various countries, chief of them Qatar. The factories sold these products for much more than their global market price. The article states further that the Abna Sina' company, which has a monopoly on transporting goods to the Rafah crossing and into Gaza, and is connected to Mahmoud Abd Al-Fattah Al-Sisi, the son of the Egyptian president, charges thousands of dollars for every aid truck that enters the Strip.
For background on these issues, we start with OCCRP January 25, 2024 :
...Hala … lists offices in Cairo and in Rafah on its website, but also works with at least seven local agents in Gaza, according to its social media posts. The company ...is owned by the prominent Egyptian businessman Ibrahim Al-Organi, who heads the Tarabin tribe in the Sinai desert [and is one of eight businesses in the] Organi Group, which also includes a joint venture, Misr Sinai, with the Defense Ministry’s industrial conglomerate, the National Services Projects Organization (NSPO), Organi said in a 2014 interview with the Egyptian outlet Youm7.
In the interview, Organi said NSPO owned 51 percent of the company’s shares, in partnership with two companies owned by [the Egyptian military’s) General Intelligence Service....
“As you can see, all state entities are in this company. This gives us an advantage,” Organi said in the interview.
[TheLondonTimes reported May 6, 2024 that Hala, part of the Al-Arjani group of companies owned by Ibrahim Al-Arjani, reportedly affiliated with the Egyptian government and staffed by former Egyptian soldiers] has made a reported $88 million by facilitating the evacuation of Palestinians from Gaza. … Ibrahim Al-Arjani – a prominent businessman from Sinai [is often called} the "King of the Crossing," a title reflecting his significant influence over the border at Rafah.
According to the Arabi21 website, Hala was established in 2019 to provide "VIP travel services" from Gaza to Egypt, at a price ranging from $350 to $1,200 depending on the season. Those [using] the service avoided the long wait for official approval and an exhausting three-day stopover journey through Sinai to Cairo. Typical [customers:} the well-to-do in Gaza ... and Gazan students [needing to be sure of arriving] in time when studying in Egyptian universities.
Services ... stopped after October 7 ...[resumed] in January with high fees, according to the OCCRP.
The Times [further] reported that testimonials obtained by Britain's Sky News TV channel and the BBC in February supported allegations that travelers paid a $5,000 fee to exit Gaza. The newspaper contacted Hala for comment but did not receive a response. In a separate investigation published last week, the Middle East Eye website analyzed the daily lists of clients' names being published by the Hala company, revealing its significant revenues generated in April.
That month, approximately $58 million was amassed from the passage of 10,136 adults and 2,910 children exiting the Rafah crossing using [Hala,] an average daily income of $2 million – nearly double the firm's estimated earnings from March. The highest recorded single-day profits [to date was April 30, 2024] with Hala reportedly earning at least $2.3 million from people fleeing Gaza.
Egyptian political analyst Maged Mandour wrote that Egypt's regime elites "are using the war in Gaza to enrich themselves at the expense of desperate Palestinians. It is not only inhumane, but also damaging to the domestic credibility of the regime of President Abdel-Fattah al-Sissi."…
Following the Times' report, Arabi21 spoke to Palestinians in Gaza … [Some Palestinians accused Hala of complicity, while others said they hoped Al-Arjani might experience similar financial burdens or health issues or speculated] that the Egyptian government is using Hala to address its own financial woes. "If the intention was genuinely to aid the people of Gaza, why impose such high fees [to exit Rafah]? Why not simply open the crossing?"
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DohaNews - January 31, 2024 <big><big>Charity slams Egypt-linked ‘bribery’ as $5,000 demand per aid truck hampers Gaza help</big></big>
...Organi-owned companies charge [as much as] a staggering $9,000 per truck for commercial traffic entering Gaza, while truckers report receiving only $300 per load.
However, UN agency UNRWA denies paying fees for aid transfers into Gaza from Egypt…
...Egypt has refuted claims of profiteering from the Rafah border crossing and disclaimed responsibility for the prolonged queues of trucks carrying humanitarian aid at the Egyptian side of the border….
...While in Somalia, Egypt’s President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi accused Israel of causing delays for trucks on the Gaza side of the Rafah border, saying: “If I am the reason for not letting a loaf of bread into Gaza, how could I face God?”…
...Around 80% of those facing famine or catastrophic hunger globally are now residents of Gaza, a condition that signifies an unparalleled humanitarian crisis within the Gaza Strip amidst the ongoing bombardment and blockade by Israel, UN human rights experts said on January 16, according to an OHCHR statement….
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Worldcrunch.com - January 30, 2024 <big><big>Inside The Egyptian-Run Black Market For Escaping Out Of Gaza </big>[now charging up to $10,000 per person, according to Palestinians and Egyptians who want to leave].</big>
...For years, a network of travel agents and brokers based in Egypt and Gaza have offered fast-track visas through Rafah for a price ranging from several hundred to several thousand dollars. The price has depended on how many times the crossing would be made; the urgency of the travel; or whether the person in question faces security restrictions [on] visiting Egypt or crossing it into a third country….
Brokers are now charging Palestinians between $4,500 and $10,000 ... according to interviews with 15 Palestinians and Egyptians who want to leave the Strip. For Egyptians in Gaza, the bill amounts to about $650 each. Two interviewees have already left Gaza four weeks ago after paying $4,500 each. Three said travel agents and brokers have deceived them and they lost their money. Others were desperately trying to raise the funds.
[Rasha] Ibrahim, [an Egyptian mother of three, married to a Palestinian, submitted a request on [the Egyptian government’s] online platform … for Egyptians who want to leave Gaza, after she and her family fled south, intending to leave. She has yet to receive a response. So,] she contacted the most famous Egyptian travel agency, “Hala Tourism.” An agent told her that the travel of her husband and their three children would cost $40,000, she said. “There's no way can we afford this amount...”
Hala Tourism did not respond to repeated requests for comment….
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LeMonde January 25, 2024<big><big>$7,000 to escape Gaza: How Palestinians fleeing to Egypt are extorted</big></big> A network of brokers and travel agencies, linked to Egyptian intelligence services, sell permits to exit the Palestinian enclave at exorbitant prices.
...According to an investigation carried out by the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) and the independent Egyptian fact-checking website Saheeh Masr, intermediaries sell this precious permit at prices ranging from $4,500 to $10,000 (€4,100 to €9,200) for Palestinians, and from $650 to $1,200 for Egyptians. Independent brokers, some with dubious credentials, have ventured into this highly profitable business. One of the service providers most often recommended by Gazans is the Egyptian travel agency Hala Consulting and Tourism, founded by Ibrahim El-Argani, a businessman from the Sinai region with links to Egyptian intelligence services….
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OCCRP January 25, 2024 <big><big> ‘Only Those With Money Can Leave’</big></big>
According to this report, online travel agencies and social media groups openly advertise the wildly fluctuating prices, currently $4,500 to $10,000 for each Palestinian, $650 to $1,200 for a person of Egyptian nationality, other foreign passport holders $3,000. OCCRP was unable to discover how speedy clearance by Egyptian security is achieved, but a bribe system has long been alleged including in 2022 testimony collected by Human Rights Watch. On January 10, Diaa Rashwan, head of Egypt’s state Information Service, published a statement denying that any bribery or extortion is involved,
The report explains that Hamas Interior Ministry on one side, and Egyptian security forces —including the General Intelligence Service— on the other, with Israel monitoring from a nearby military base, had handled crossings since 2007, but the process was always sporadic, with unpredictable criteria, according to Lorenzo Navone, a sociology lecturer at the University of Strasbourg.
Until the 2023 Israel-Hamas war, it required registering a request with the Interior Ministry, then often waiting 2 months in winter to six in summer, if sometimes sooner for medical needs travelers. But even with a permit, unforeseeable reasons by Egyptian authors might prevent crossing.
...That’s where companies like Hala Consulting and Tourism, an Egyptian travel agency, stepped in. In 2019, the company started offering a VIP service referred to as “coordination,” or “tanseeq” in Arabic, to cross the Rafah border quickly and comfortably. For $1,200, the company would provide a permit within 48 hours, and a hassle-free trip from Gaza to Cairo, according to media reports at the time.
In a 2018 report by the UN’s humanitarian agency OCHA, this was due to a “two list” coordination system by which Hala got official Egyptian approval bypassing Hamas’s registrants, who be left waiting months longer.
...According to figures published on Facebook by Hamas’s border authorities, roughly one quarter of travelers in the two years prior to the war crossed the border through Egypt’s “coordination” list….
...[On January 10, 2024, the head of a Gaza-based travel agency listed in Instagram as a Hala agent] told a reporter posing as a potential customer that he would need to pay $5,000 each for his Palestinian sister and mother to leave Gaza within seven days, [and that Hamas no longer did registrations]. “The Palestinian side has nothing to do with these permits anymore. It is purely an Egyptian intelligence operation...”
[The credentials offered in December by an Egypt-based broker with no known travel agency affiliation whom OCCRP reporters contacted, were texted copies of his identity card, a receipt from a previous customer, and] Palestinian passports for which he had obtained exit permits. “You pay half the price now through Vodafone cash ... and the rest when you cross...”
Asked [to] provide names [and phone numbers of successfully exited clients] he responded: “Sister… after they cross, we destroy [all records]. If these files fall into the hands of anybody it will be a problem, understood?”
Even severely injured Palestinians have to pay their way out, said Maher Mahmoud, a 23-year-old Palestinian [mobile phone seller in Cairo told OCCRP]. “The brokers [wanted] $9,500 to take out my wife, and $7,000 each for my two nieces ... who [were seriously injured in the war, now wheelchair-bound. They] were visiting relatives in Gaza when the war broke out, and lost their mother and other siblings …
...One of the journalists who worked on this story, a Palestinian living in London, paid a fixer $2,000 via a local money changer in November to try to evacuate her mother, who was visiting Gaza from the U.K. when the war broke out.
He later returned the money and told her that the “Egyptians are asking for up to $5,000 and I cannot ask you to pay that.”
“Prices are increasing by the day,” he said in a voice recording sent to the journalist, who requested anonymity in order not to jeopardize her mother’s journey. “Those who pay more cross. The Rafah crossing has turned into a black market and a place for mafias to operate. When the prices stabilize, I will get back to you with a quote to take her out.”
She is still waiting.
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MiddleEastEye - January 19, 2024 <big><big>War on Gaza: Palestinians paying mediators thousands of dollars to escape into Egypt</big></big>
The in-cash demand routinely requires selling everything of value they own to whomever will buy at whatever price, plus financial help from relatives in Europe and the Americas. Then if successful, they encounter anti-immigrant sentiment generated by pro-state supporters on social media, blaming the devastating economic failures of President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi’s government on Syrian, Sudanese, and other African refugees.
...Passing into Egypt from Gaza on New Year’s Eve alongside his two children, brother, and seriously injured wife, Mahmoud felt he could finally breathe a little more easily… he paid $15,000 to a “mediator” in Gaza. [None of the family has] dual nationality [and his wife wasn’t registered as severely injured, so they were not allowed to leave] unless their names appeared on the daily lists of Palestinians permitted to pass over into Egypt….
...With the border closed most of the time, only a limited number … have been able to leave ... since 7 October... [yet the situation] opened the door for “mediators” to profit amidst the carnage[, charging,] according to multiple sources … from $2,000 for children, to between $5,000 and $7,000 for adults….
Even before the war, these operators were known as well-connected people [with] relationships with either Hamas, Egyptian intelligence officials, or both, usually facilitating the exit of Palestinians looking to ... study, emigrate, undertake the Hajj pilgrimage, or get specialised medical treatment.
[The Egyptian government denies it but] a retired security source, who used to work with Egypt’s military intelligence in North Sinai, confirmed [to MiddleEastEye] the existence of a network of mediators connected to the state’s security apparatus….
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France24 - November 21, 2021 <big><big>Gaza anger mounts at cost, 'humiliation' of Egypt journeys</big></big>
Gaza resident Mustafa al-Sawaf posted a scathing criticism online of the "path of humiliation" Palestinians endure when leaving the crowded enclave for Egypt, and of the companies that profit from it. Within an hour, his phone rang.
"Someone from Hamas called and told me to erase everything," Sawaf said… The caller said the border business was "a very sensitive subject for the Egyptians, and that my article was going to harm Palestinians," said Sawaf, a political analyst.
He quickly [complied, but it already had] dozens of supportive comments, reflecting widespread frustration about Gaza's main lifeline to the outside world.
The 380 kilometre (240 mile) road trip to Cairo passes though the sweltering deserts of the Sinai peninsula, where the Egyptian army fights the Islamic State group and operates checkpoints and night-time curfews. It also crosses the Suez Canal.
The common complaint in Gaza is that the journey, [usually] on stuffy buses, is made deliberately more arduous and uncertain so that travel operators can profit by offering hassle-free "VIP services" to those who can afford them….
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Al-Jazeera - 23 December 2019 Palestinians paying thousands of dollars in bribes to leave Gaza Palestinians in Gaza say it could cost up to $4,000 to expedite travel from the blockaded territory to Egypt.
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TheNewArab - August 22, 2019 <big><big>Human rights at a premium: How this Egyptian company profits from the blockade of Gaza</big></big> With Gaza under a crippling Israeli-Egyptian siege, an Egyptian company is profiting charges thousands of dollars for 'dignified passage' through the usual humiliation at Rafah crossing.
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Middle East Monitor - June 11, 2019 <big><big>Egypt company launches ‘VIP travel service’ for Gaza Palestinians</big></big>
An Egyptian private travel company has launched a new “paid service” for the residents of the occupied Gaza Strip via the Egypt-Palestine Rafah crossing. The company, Hala for Tourism Services, would provide the service through its newly-established VIP lounge inside the Egyptian side of the crossing.
Official source at Hala told the Anadolu Agency that the company would start accepting applications from those wishing to benefit from its new VIP service tomorrow. He added that the company had two branches, one in the Egyptian capital of Cairo and the other in Palestinian Rafah city.
“This new service will provide the Palestinians with full travel assistance, starting from the transfer of the traveller from the Strip to their final destination and vice versa,” the official source said, continuing that the chargeable service would include “the cost of a transit visa as well as the transportation fare.”
“The service for outbound travellers from Gaza will cost $1,200 per person, $600 for minors aged from eight to 16 years old, younger children will be exempt from any fees,” the source pointed out. “VIP service for inbound travellers to Gaza will cost $600,” he said.
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It’s possible Hala has indeed been taken down by the Egyptian government but possibly only in name; the al-Organi company’s range of services appear to overlap in such a way that exit-at-exorbitant price will still go on, for anyone who has the financial resources.
If the al-Organi company is entirely out of the exit profiteering business, either leaving will be much more difficult, or more competitors will rush to fill the gap, or something in between.
At the moment, there does not seem to be more recent reportage on the bribes allegedly required for letting aid trucks through.
