Testimonies from market traders in the Gaza Strip, as well as members of Hamas, showed that there is a crisis among the movement’s members in disbursing their salaries in cash, with many merchants resorting to reducing their acceptance of currencies and relying on applications and electronic wallets.
This coincided with Israel's intensification of targeting and assassinating Hamas financial officials over the past weeks, and it turned out that among them were some of those responsible for transferring salaries to members of the movement.
According to Hamas employees, the majority of them, whether from the government sector or the military arm (Al-Qassam Brigades), receive their salaries in cash.
It is noteworthy that during the height of the war, Gazans struggled to transfer their money from electronic form to cash.
Last August, Israel canceled dealing in a certain denomination of shekel notes. In a move to strangle Hamas economically. The Hamas police force issued a circular warning shop owners and others not to deal in cash.
On Sunday, the Syrian authorities announced the dismantling of a cell affiliated with the terrorist organization ISIS, which was involved in kidnappings, planting explosive devices and assassinations, and whose activity extended from Raqqa to Aleppo, Idlib and Homs.
The Internal Security Forces stated that a series of security operations resulted in the arrest of four of the cell leaders in Raqqa, along with a number of its members in Aleppo, Idlib and Homs, after tracking their activities and movements, in addition to seizing explosive materials that were prepared to carry out attacks.
She explained that preliminary investigations revealed the involvement of cell members in 5 kidnapping operations, in addition to planning to carry out other attacks, noting that investigations are continuing in preparation for referring the detainees to the competent judiciary.
On August 18, the Internal Security Forces and the General Intelligence Service announced the arrest of Hamza Abdullah Muhammad, nicknamed “Abu Jihad al-Muhajir,” in the Manbij countryside in Aleppo Governorate, and described him as one of the prominent military leaders in ISIS.
The Syrian authorities announced today (Sunday) that they began this week to deliver imported gasoline to Iraq, following the disruption of shipping traffic in the Strait of Hormuz due to the war in the Middle East.
The Syrian News Agency (SANA) reported: “The Syrian Petroleum Company began transporting gasoline supplied to Iraq through the Baniyas oil terminal.”
The agency indicated that the step falls “within a 3-month renewable agreement to secure energy supplies, in light of the disruption of navigation traffic through the Strait of Hormuz.”
The agency quoted the Executive Vice President of the Transport and Storage Sector at the Syrian Petroleum Company, Engineer Ahmed Qabaji, as saying: “Gasoline transport operations to Iraq began on Thursday with 57 tanks in the first batch, and work is underway to raise the operational capacity to about 200 tanks per day through the Al-Tanf crossing.”
He pointed out that the Qatari company UCC “purchases the material from several international sources, while the Syrian authorities transport it in exchange for transit fees.”
Qabaji pointed out that transit operations “provide revenues for the company and the state, and support Syria’s role as a corridor for import and export and the transfer of materials and energy between the countries of the region.”
At the beginning of April, Iraq announced the start of transporting oil in trucks through Syrian territory for the purpose of exporting it due to the closure of the Strait of Hormuz.
On Sunday, Qabaji said, “The number of transported tanks currently ranges between 1,000 and 1,200 tanks per day.”
Since coming to power following the overthrow of Bashar al-Assad in late 2024, the new Syrian authorities have been seeking to revive the country's economy and rebuild its infrastructure, which was severely damaged by a war that lasted more than a decade.
Syrian officials said that a memorandum of understanding related to the Kirkuk-Baniyas line was concluded with the Iraqi side, and that the discussions had reached their final stages to transform the memorandum of understanding into a contract, in preparation for the start of executive work on the ground.
