Gaza Strip smuggling tunnels in the Gaza Strip. Following the takeover, Egypt and Israel largely sealed their border crossings with Gaza, on the grounds that Fatah had fled and was no longer providing security on the Palestinian side.<ref name="nytimes.com/">Isabel Kershner. Abbas’s Premier Tells Israel to Reopen Gaza. New York Times. 14 December 2007.</ref> So Karni and Rafah checkpoints were closed again, resulting in "severe personal and economic hardship for Gaza's 1,4 million population", according to OCHA. Thousands of travelers have been stranded on both sides of the border. The blockade of the Gaza Strip has caused a shortage of certain basic products, especially construction
Gaza Strip Human Rights Watch has declared at the UN Human Rights Council that it views Israel as a "de facto" occupying power in the Gaza Strip, even though Israel has no military or other presence, because the Oslo Accords authorize Israel to control the airspace and the territorial sea. In his statement on the 2008–2009 Israel–Gaza conflict, Richard Falk, United Nations Special Rapporteur wrote that international humanitarian law applied to Israel "in regard to the obligations of an Occupying Power and in the requirements of the laws of war." Amnesty International, the World Health Organization, Oxfam, the International Committee of the