A Palestinian human rights center said on Thursday that the Israeli occupation authorities continue to spray agricultural land in the border areas surrounding the Gaza Strip with chemical pesticides, causing the destruction of crops, and harm the environment and public health.
"Israel has started spraying agricultural land along the security fence, with chemical pesticides, during the last five years, about 30 times," the non-governmental Al-Mezan Center for Human Rights said in a report published on Thursday.
The report noted that spraying was conducted "suddenly and without warning to farmers, with chemicals unknown period of safety," and repeated during two periods annually, to target winter and summer crops.
The report pointed out that the Israeli aircraft flying at low altitudes about 20 meters above the ground, and spray spraying pesticides to a depth of (700-1200) meters inside the territory of the Gaza Strip.
The area of ​​agricultural land affected by the spraying of chemical pesticides about 7268 dunums, according to the report.
According to research conducted by the Center, it was found that the target plants were infected with "oxygen", a toxic substance, which causes serious repercussions on the health of human beings and organisms, if taken by mouth.
The report added: "While the period of stay of this article with soil is about 60-80 days, while the inability to decompose affect the health and quality of the soil."
The report said that the Israeli Defense Ministry had revealed in 2016 that the substances used in the spraying are glyphosate, Oxygal and Europex, noting that the World Health Organization´s Cancer Research Agency has classified glyphosate as one of the possible carcinogenic compounds.
They also affect the lives and offspring of sheep. In one case, fetuses with birth defects were born, while others died.
On the other hand, the report showed that the spraying operations "caused economic damage to the farmers who own the land."
Livestock breeders, according to the report, suffered heavy losses because they had to buy food for their livestock at their expense, instead of the "herbs" in the land, which doubled the cost of raising them.
Hebrew press reports revealed that the Israeli authorities are using pesticides with dangerous effects, in the fence area surrounding the Gaza Strip, to prevent plants from growing, and keep the area empty so that the army forces to monitor them well.
The Ministry of Agriculture in the Gaza Strip says that Israel´s spraying of pesticides is causing damage to large areas of Palestinian agricultural land near the fence.
The population of the Gaza Strip has been suffering from a difficult economic and humanitarian situation since the imposition of the Israeli siege on it in 2006, due to the closure of the border crossings and outlets and restrictions on patients referred for treatment abroad.
