{"id":9392,"date":"2011-01-10T00:00:20","date_gmt":"2011-01-09T23:00:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=9392"},"modified":"2011-01-07T15:42:28","modified_gmt":"2011-01-07T14:42:28","slug":"wikileaks-israel-demanded-bribes-for-goods-entering-gaza","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2011\/01\/wikileaks-israel-demanded-bribes-for-goods-entering-gaza\/","title":{"rendered":"WikiLeaks: Israel Demanded Bribes for Goods Entering Gaza"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em>Joint June 2006 cable dispatched by U.S. diplomats in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem cites Coca Cola, Procter &amp; Gamble, Motorola and Dell as some of the companies subject to corruption at the Karni Crossing.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>A key Israeli cargo crossing for goods entering the Gaza Strip was rife with corruption, according to a U.S. diplomatic cable released by WikiLeaks on Thursday [6 Jan 2011]<\/p>\n<p>The June 14, 2006, cable, published Thursday by Norway&#8217;s Aftenposten daily, says companies told U.S. diplomats they were forced to pay hefty bribes to get goods into Gaza. It was unclear whether the practice still continues.<\/p>\n<p>There was no immediate comment from Israel.<\/p>\n<p>The document quoted a local Coca-Cola distributor as saying he was asked to pay more than $3,000 to get a truckload of merchandise through the Karni Crossing. The executive claimed an unidentified high-level official at the crossing headed the corruption ring.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Corruption extends to Karni management and involves logistics companies working as middlemen for military and civilian officials at the terminal,&#8221; the document says.<\/p>\n<p>The executive was identified as Joerg Hartmann, with Coca-Cola&#8217;s distributor in the West Bank. The company did not immediately return a call seeking comment.<\/p>\n<p>Other companies, including Procter &amp; Gamble, Caterpillar, Philip Morris, Westinghouse, Hewlett-Packard, Motorola, Aramex and Dell, had complained of corruption at the crossing, according to the cable.<\/p>\n<p>It was not clear which companies had actually paid the bribes, though the document said Caterpillar executives refused to pay.<\/p>\n<p>The alleged corruption occurred a year before Hamas overran Gaza and Israel imposed an economic blockade. At that time, however, Israeli-Palestinian violence frequently closed the border crossings.<\/p>\n<p>Hartmann told U.S. diplomats that the cost of the bribes would rise after extended closures of the border.<\/p>\n<p>The document was identified as a joint cable by the U.S. ambassador to Israel in Tel Aviv and the American consul-general in Jerusalem, who works closely with the Palestinians. The embassy had no immediate comment.<\/p>\n<p><a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.haaretz.com\/news\/diplomacy-defense\/wikileaks-israel-demanded-bribes-for-goods-entering-gaza-1.335585\" >Go to Original \u2013 haaretz.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Joint June 2006 cable dispatched by U.S. diplomats in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem cites Coca Cola, Procter &#038; Gamble, Motorola and Dell as some of the companies subject to corruption at the Karni Crossing. A key Israeli cargo crossing for goods entering the Gaza Strip was rife with corruption, according to a U.S. diplomatic cable released by WikiLeaks on Thursday [6 Jan 2011]. The June 14, 2006, cable, published Thursday by Norway&#8217;s Aftenposten daily, says companies told U.S. diplomats they were forced to pay hefty bribes to get goods into Gaza.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[58],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9392","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9392","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9392"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9392\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9392"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9392"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9392"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}