Israel today more than halved the fishing zone off the coast of the Gaza Strip “until further notice”.

According to a statement by Israel’s Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT) – which administers Area C of the occupied West Bank, as well as the besieged Gaza Strip – Israel today scaled back the Strip’s permitted fishing zone from 15 nautical miles to six “until further notice”.

The move comes less than a month after Israel expanded the fishing zone from six nautical miles to 15 nautical miles as part of an unofficial ceasefire agreement with Hamas, which governs the Strip.

The Egyptian-brokered ceasefire would see the Great March of Return protests scaled back, in return for a loosening of Israel’s stranglehold on Gaza’s economy and access to humanitarian resources.

Despite the official expansion, reports emerged from Gaza that this was only applied to isolated areas of the Strip’s coastline and that Israeli navy ships prevented Gazan fishermen from entering the newly-expanded zones.

Locals reported that the Israeli ships fired water cannons at the fishing boats, trying to sink them and forcing them to flee.

Israel repeatedly attacks Gaza’s fishermen.

(MEMO, PC, Social Media)