Gaza, Oct. 31 (Xinhua) -- Islamic Hamas movement, which has been ruling the Gaza Strip since 2007, handed over financial control on the coastal enclave's crossing points to the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) unity government, officials said Tuesday.
Hisham Odwan, spokesman of the Hamas-run crossings and borders corporation, told reporters "Today is the first step, which is handing over financial control, or financial collection, to the consensus government."
"What happened today is a preparation to the official handover of the crossing points to the Palestinian unity government, which will be tomorrow Wednesday November 1," said Odwan.
On Tuesday, a delegation representing the PNA-affiliated Bank of Palestine arrived at Rafah crossing point between the Gaza Strip and Egypt to handover the process of financial collection of taxes and customs fees.
"The delegation of Bank of Palestine arrived at the crossing to checkout its offices at the crossing point, where through the bank, the fees of passing through the crossing which is 75 Shekels (22 U.S. dollars) for each individual will go to the treasury of the consensus government through the bank," said Odwan.
In October 12, Hamas and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah Party signed an Egyptian-brokered reconciliation agreement in Cairo, that enables the consensus government of Prime Minister Rami Hamdallah to takeover control on the Gaza Strip.
Over the past ten years, Hamas, which was the ruler of the coastal enclave, has been collecting taxes and customs fees from passengers, who travel through the crossing points, and goods which are imported to the Gaza Strip.
There are no exact figures about how much taxes Hamas had collected from the populations in the Gaza Strip. But Maher Taba'a, the official in Gaza Chamber of Commerce estimated that Hamas has been collecting around 100 million U.S. dollars every month from the populations.
"This includes taxes imposed on imported fuels, cigarettes, food, clothes, medicine as well as traffic fines, medical insurance, fees for constructing houses and fees for licensing vehicles," he said.
