Kings of famine

During Ramadan last year, a delegation of Palestinian businessmen residing in Egypt held a meeting with Sinai businessman Ibrahim al-Argany.

The purpose of the meeting was to inform Argany of “Palestinian businessmen, traders and citizens’ discontent” with the mechanism for the entry of goods into the Gaza Strip, a mechanism that had “created a state of monopoly and a lack of competition that contributed to price increases,” according to a report sent by Palestinian National Economy Minister Mohamed al-Amour to Prime Minister Mohamed Mostafa in April 2024.

Discussions at the Ramadan meeting focused on the monopoly held by five Palestinian companies over the import of goods through the Rafah border crossing in partnership with Argany’s Sons of Sinai company, in exchange for extortionate fees collected by several parties. This process became known as “goods coordination.”

Argany explained, according to Amour’s report, that the approval of these five companies “came at the behest of Israel, and that he will work to amend and expand the list of [company] names with the official entities that coordinate with the Israeli side.”

When it came to the price increases in Gaza, however, Sons of Sinai defended its position in the meeting.

“Since Palestinian traders receive huge sums from this trade (due to monopoly) and profit from it, why can’t Sons of Sinai profit as well??!!!,” the report quotes Argany as saying during the meeting, adding that his company then vowed to reduce prices “if Palestinians traders lower their prices.”

The profit made from “goods coordination” is massive, according to a database compiled by the Gaza Governorate Chamber of Commerce obtained by Mada Masr and whose findings are published here for the first time. The data shows that funds allocated for coordinating the entry of goods into the strip over the past two years have exceeded US$1 billion.

The Palestinian National Economy Ministry’s report — obtained by Mada Masr and published here for the first time — reveals the features of the monopolistic system that has dominated the entry and transport of aid and commercial goods into the strip, a system that Israel established in the first few months of the war it launched on Gaza in October 2023. Several parties have participated in this lucrative scheme, which has generated billions of dollars through the storage, transportation, provision of security for and sale of goods at unprecedented rates — all at the expense of millions in Gaza suffering from hunger amid a genocide of unimaginable proportions.

Behind this monopoly scheme stands a network of businessmen who profit from the “widespread starvation and destitution” that Palestinians in Gaza suffer. From his side, Argany controls what is known as “the Egyptian line,” while others control the “Israeli line.” Both sides have reaped staggering profits under this complicated system that has undergone several changes in the past two years but remains under complete Israeli control.

***

After the flow of everything came to a standstill in the first few weeks of the war, international pressure pushed Israel to allow the limited entry of humanitarian aid into the strip by November 2023. At the beginning of the war, the Israeli side relied on the already existing infrastructure for the entry and distribution of aid in Gaza, led by various United Nations-affiliated networks and major international aid organizations.

On the Egyptian side of the border, Sons of Sinai was the only company equipped with the infrastructure and logistics set-up capable of managing the storage, shipment and transportation of aid from Arish on the Egyptian side.

This set-up was established years before the war, when the Argany-owned company presented itself as uniquely offering its services “not only in shipping goods to and from Gaza, but also [in] guaranteeing the complete safety of your shipment from beginning to end,” according to a Facebook post from 2022.

Over the years, Argany and traders in Gaza held frequent meetings in order to “remove any obstacles and to facilitate export operations to the strip,” Argany said in 2019. From a video at the time, Argany can be heard adding that the meetings also included discussions over prices, among other issues.

At that time, Sons of Sinai charged fees ranging from $3,000 to $5,000 for each truck of goods that entered Gaza, several traders operating in Arish and Gaza who worked with the company told Mada Masr.

When the entry of aid into the strip was resumed a month into Israel’s onslaught on Gaza, it was the existence of this groundwork laid by the company that led various international organizations and even several donor-countries to rely on Sons of Sinai to deliver necessary supplies into the strip.

The scene at the Rafah border crossing at the time made clear what was happening: employees of Argany companies — including former leaders in the Union of Sinai Tribes — were spread out around trucks to number, organize and inspect them before they were sent off to the Israeli border crossings. Vehicles affiliated with Misr Sinai for Industrial Development and Investment and Itous for Security Services — both owned by Argany — were also present. Truck drivers headed to the Sons of Sinai’s freight-forwarding office (for loading and unloading) at the border crossing to sign the document confirming the end of their trip after they had unloaded their shipments on the Israeli side of the crossing.

But no amount of aid passing through this system was even close enough to meeting the needs of the people in Gaza, especially given the mass destruction Israel was deliberately inflicting and continues to inflict as a tactic in its unprecedented war on the strip and the waves of mass displacement of residents it continues to cause.

Commercial goods offered in markets quickly became scarce and prices began to soar.

International actors — including the United States — intervened to allow the entry of commercial goods alongside aid shipments, a move that former US State Department Spokesperson Matthew Miller said in December 2023 was aimed at "improving the lives of the Palestinian people in Gaza that we see not just humanitarian aid delivered, but also commercial goods that can be sold in stores and markets.”

Israel’s compliance in December was driven by several factors.

On one hand, it alleviated some of the pressure Israel was being subjected to, especially given that it had no intention of ending the war at the time. On the other, if Israel was to be pressured to allow anything into the strip, it preferred commercial goods over aid.

Goods are sold at prices that many Palestinians in Gaza struggle to afford, in contrast to the aid they receive at no cost. Ultimately, Israel registers all that enters the strip as “aid,” with no regard to whether the shipment is in fact aid or commercial goods, as is clear in its official database.

By classifying all supplies this way, Israel inflates the statistical picture of what it allows into Gaza as “aid.”

But Israel was not going to allow goods or aid into the strip without very clear parameters. And so it established a tight system for the entry of these goods. And over the course of the next two years, this system would undergo repeated changes.

At first, Israel granted five Palestinian companies the exclusive right to import goods into Gaza, according to the Palestinian national economy minister’s report. This marked the start of what became known among Palestinians as “goods coordination.”

Under this system, sellers in Gaza contact one of the five trading companies to import goods through their Israel-issued permits. In exchange, they pay the company a fee.

The five companies were Saqqa and Khoudary General Contracting Co. Ltd., Emad Eddin Nijm for Trading and Contracting, Ezzo Akl for Transport and General Trade, Mohamed al-Khazendar’s Gaza Oil Company for General Trading - Three Brothers (fuel import and marketing services) and Ibrahim al-Taweel for General Trading.

In his report, the Palestinian national economy minister described these companies as unspecialized in the import and marketing of basic commodities, adding that their tasks were limited to coordinating with the Israeli side on behalf of Palestinian sellers.

All the commercial goods that entered the strip in the first few months of the war — after they were greenlit in January 2024 — came from Egypt, Gaza Governorate Chamber of Commerce head Ayed Abu Ramadan explains to Mada Masr.

The Palestinian National Economy Ministry report explains that the five Palestinian companies — which hold Israeli permits — communicated their requests for goods to Sons of Sinai, which then handled everything related to the procurement, shipping and transport of the goods and arranged their entry through the crossings.

At that point, the trucks that carried commercial goods and aid shipments would head to the Rafah border crossing before moving to the Israeli inspection checkpoints — either at the Karam Abu Salem crossing (between Gaza and Israel) or the Awja crossing (between Egypt and Israel).

After Israeli inspection, the trucks would return to Rafah once again where the contents would be handed over to the Palestinian side: aid going to relief organizations and goods going to sellers and their representatives. The cargo of each truck and its nature was identified by the truck’s number and the national ID number of its driver, according to a Rafah Governorate Chamber of Commerce official who spoke to Mada Masr on condition of anonymity.

This operation — from its beginning until sellers receive the goods — “relies on verbal agreements between all parties,” the official adds.

At the time, the five trading companies charged Gaza sellers fees ranging between $10,000 and $25,000 for each truck, with pricing variance coming down to the type of goods, according to the Palestinian national economy minister’s report.

Sons of Sinai, for its part, was receiving between $7,000 and $13,000 for coordinating and transporting each truck, according to the report, in addition to $1,000 in “fees and charges” and $60 for each waiting day at the crossing — a delay that could last up to a month — as well as $9,000 to bypass the waiting period altogether.

This caused prices inside Gaza to soar. Chambers of commerce in Gaza called for all companies to be allowed to import goods freely so that “the monopoly held by Sons of Sinai and the five companies be broken,” the report lays out.

According to the Gaza Governorate Chamber of Commerce database, the coordination costs from January to May of last year exceeded $28 million. Though the amount is significant, it multiplied dozens of times in the following months as the nightmare of the genocide continued.

During his meeting with Palestinian businessmen, Argany pledged that he “would work to amend and increase the number of names with the official bodies that meet with the Israeli side.”

And it seems that Argany did intervene, as the Palestinian national economy minister’s report indicated that a change did actually take place a few weeks after the meeting between Argany and Palestinian businessmen. After Eid al-Fitr, in April 2024, the number of trading companies jumped to 25, with the five original Palestinian companies remaining in the picture.

The system that had been in place since late 2023 persisted until May 2024, when Israel invaded the Rafah crossing and occupied the Palestinian side, causing significant tension in Egyptian-Israeli relations.

Israel began to allow the entry of goods from the West Bank. And the crossing point shifted from Rafah to Karam Abu Salem, under full Israeli control and without an official Palestinian presence following the occupation of the Rafah crossing — which had been previously controlled by the Hamas government.

Despite these changes, Sons of Sinai was still able to find a way to ensure commercial goods entered from Egypt, and, most importantly, it maintained its control over the Egyptian line.

In general, when imports are available through both the Egyptian and Israeli lines, sellers usually prefer the Egyptian line due to the greater variety of goods and lower prices compared to the Israeli alternative. This system of operation continued until Israel imposed an official ban on the entry of goods from all entry points in October 2024, claiming Hamas members were profiting from the trade.

But the Israeli-imposed ban did not stop the entry of commercial goods, either through Egypt or the West Bank.

“The private sector was banned from importing anything, but we saw it bringing in everything,” Abu Ramadan says, adding that this happened through a complicated network he described as “the war mafia” operating in Egypt and Israel.

According to a report by the Federation of Palestinian Chambers of Commerce, this network relied on bringing commercial goods into the strip under the guise of humanitarian aid.

All commercial goods that entered Gaza since the Israeli ban entered through this channel, according to the Federations’s December 2024 report.

This marked the beginning of a new phase of coordination.

A source in the Rafah Chamber of Commerce explains to Mada Masr that sellers would contact one of the Palestinian trading companies with an Israeli permit — and, if the requested goods were from Egypt, the trading company would contact Sons of Sinai to place the order. The latter then would facilitate the procedures. The same method was adopted with goods coming from the West Bank, but through other companies.

According to Abu Ramadan, trading companies — in coordination with employees of humanitarian organizations in Egypt and Israel — forged the required paperwork to change the identification of goods to aid. This mechanism relies entirely on regional and international organizations that are allowed to bring in aid and with whom informal understandings are made to allow the entry of a portion of commercial goods as part of their aid shipments, in exchange for payments to the organizations’ employees.

During this period, a diverse group of employees working for international organizations — including the World Central Kitchen, Rahma and Anera — began to take part in the smuggling of commercial goods under the cover of aid, Abu Ramadan and the Rafah Governorate Commerce Chamber official tell Mada Masr.

A copy of one of the Israeli military’s Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT)’s record sheets for one of the crossings, reviewed by Mada Masr, confirms the claims made by both sources. The record sheet included various types of commodities that do not typically count as aid but enter the strip only as commercial goods.

The Palestinian logistics company Manhal Shehaibar, which has been operating at the Karam Abu Salem crossing for years, took over responsibility for managing the logistics for the entry of trucks.

Abu Ramadan explains that Shehaibar delivers the goods allowed by Israel to the companies operating on the Palestinian side, handling their transport and delivery to sellers or to their representatives.

“What enters through the Israeli side is allowed to pass and no one asks about its nature or recipient. Therefore, those who control these operations are the Palestinian companies at the crossing,” adds Abu Ramadan, who confirms that this all happens with Israeli supervision and complicity.

The Gaza Governorate Chamber of Commerce database shows that the value of the coordination of goods during the few months between October 2024 and the ceasefire in January 2025 reached nearly half a billion dollars.

An analysis by the Chamber of Commerce of commodity prices and supply levels in the strip during the first days of January shows that the entry of commercial goods through humanitarian channels raised prices by a significant margin, as coordination fees reached levels ranging from nearly $60,000 to $150,000 per truck — with the fee varying according to the nature of goods.

When the January ceasefire went into effect, the level of goods entering the strip under the cover of aid significantly increased. The ceasefire agreement stipulated the entry of 600 aid trucks on a daily basis from all border crossings. Israel then designated the Karam Abu Salem crossing for the aid coming from Egypt and the Erez crossing for those coming from the West Bank, Jordan and Israel.

At the time, official Egyptian media outlets — those that were allowed exclusive coverage of operations at the Egyptian side of the Rafah crossing — described the trucks entering daily through Egypt as “aid trucks” and estimated that between 300 to 350 trucks entered Gaza on a daily basis.

The head of the Hamas Media Office in Gaza, Salama Maarouf, confirmed to Mada Masr at the time that the truck number stipulated in the ceasefire agreement referred only to humanitarian aid shipments and “has nothing to do with those belonging to traders or the private sector.”

But the Gaza Governorate Chamber of Commerce’s monitoring of shipment activity in January found that “most of trucks that enter through the Karam Abu Salem crossing [from Egypt] were carrying commercial goods that were sold in local markets.”

Two sources in the Egyptian Red Crescent estimated that nearly half of aid trucks carried commercial goods. This estimation is close to the one made by the Gaza Governorate Chamber of Commerce, which put the figure at 60 percent.

An administrative source on the Egyptian side of the Awja crossing confirmed the scheme of loading aid trucks with commercial goods.

“Chocolate, apples and Chiclets can never be considered aid,” he explains.

With the increasing amount of goods and aid entering into the strip at the time, coordination costs shrunk to $20,000 per truck — a fixed fee that traders paid to Sons of Sinai regardless of the nature of goods, according to the federation report.

Meanwhile, the coordination cost for items coming in via Israel and the West Bank through the Erez crossing ranged between $150,000 and $200,000 per truck, depending on the nature of goods, according to a report by the federation.

The reason for this significant difference in cost between the Egyptian and Israeli lines remains unclear.

According to the Gaza Governorate Chamber of Commerce’s analysis, the total value of coordination fees for goods entering through Egypt, the West Bank and Israel reached nearly $332 million during the ceasefire period, which Israel breached only two months later.

These gains were divided between Sons of Sinai, which took in about $177 million from the coordination scheme, and companies operating on the side of the West Bank and Israel, which made nearly $155 million.

These earnings only pertain to the goods themselves and are separate from what traders pay coordinators in exchange for the logistics of the shipments, including their storage and transportation.

In its annual report on procurement by supplier, the United Nations noted that Sons of Sinai made deals valued at nearly $50 million through the end of 2024 with UN agencies to manage aid logistics on the Egyptian side.

But Sons of Sinai’s asking price was so high in managing aid logistics that humanitarian organizations — including the World Food Program, the Qatari Gaza Reconstruction Committee and the Qatar Fund for Development — started taking “practical steps to change aid shipment route to Erez crossing due to the extortion they face from Egyptian shipping companies,” according to a Gaza Governorate Chamber of Commerce report.

Yet these earnings pale in comparison to the profits from transporting commercial goods.

The high returns have served as a major incentive for companies to favor the transportation of goods over humanitarian aid. According to the testimonies of truck drivers on the Egyptian side who spoke to Mada Masr, trucks carrying commercial goods moved constantly, unlike aid trucks, which faced months-long delays before entry.

A truck driver working with Sons of Sinai — who started transporting commercial goods over a year ago — says, “The longest period I went without doing any unloading and reloading was for only 15 days in January.”

Meanwhile, an aid truck driver working under an international relief organization says that seven months elapsed between passing through the Karam Abu Salem crossing in June 2024 and passing through again in January when the ceasefire began. He adds that he waited all that time with a truck full of aid.

The exorbitant sums sellers pay to transport commercial goods are passed on to Palestinians in the prices of commodities being sold in the strip. And as the profits increased for those higher up the supply chain, Palestinians faced unprecedented price hikes.

The World Food Program estimated that the cost of basic food commodities in Gaza had increased by more than 1000 percent in November compared to pre-war levels.

The goods coordination scheme persisted until early March, when Israel breached the ceasefire and resumed its onslaught on the strip, initiating a broad strategy of using aid and commercial goods to exert pressure on Palestinians.

Israel imposed a blockade on the entry of all aid, with the exception of small quantities provided by the UN. The Israeli database notes that no aid entered the strip between March 2 and May 19.

In May, the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) — an organization with ties to American and Israeli intelligence and military figures — began operating in Gaza. UN, humanitarian and relief organizations unanimously agreed that it was unable to carry out its intended aid distribution role.

GHF’s distribution sites quickly turned into what Palestinians have described as “aid traps” where aid seekers, looking to feed their families, were systematically targeted and killed. Meanwhile, no other humanitarian organizations in the strip were allowed to operate.

Consequently, famine reached record levels, according to the available international indicators, signaling a new stage of the genocidal disaster. Armed groups spread throughout Gaza, eroding what remained of the strip’s social cohesion.

This presented the opportunity for a new, highly lucrative business: securing goods.

***

After the collapse of Hamas’s police in the early months of 2024, several tribes and clans tried to step in to fill the security vacuum and secure aid and commercial trucks. But Israel targeted them and eventually forced them to stop. At the same time, Israel escalated its attack against UN agencies operating in the strip, particularly UNRWA, which has extensive experience and a comprehensive infrastructure for distributing aid.

By disrupting every mechanism for delivering aid and goods and destroying any capacity to secure the convoys, it became clear, Abu Ramadan says, that Israel was deliberately seeking to “spread corruption and chaos in Gaza as a tool of war.”

Signs of famine spread across the strip, especially in the second half of the year, accompanied by two phenomena: hunger and need drove many people to seize whatever they could from aid and goods shipments, while armed gangs began spreading chaos and looting — some even under direct Israeli sponsorship. The most infamous was the group led by Yasser Abu Shabab, who was killed just last week.

Whether spontaneous or organized, this chaos created a new market demand, marking the starting point for the new business of securing goods. Security groups began coordinating via traders with the Israeli military to obtain permission to approach the crossing zones — areas designated as Israeli military zones. These groups could only move with the military’s approval of their personnel.

At first, each clan or family managed its own dealings, according to two sources, one in the Palestinian Businessmen Association and another a seller in Gaza. One family, for instance, took charge of securing the World Central Kitchen’s trucks in exchange for a share of the cargo, which it used to stock its own communal kitchen to ensure a continuous supply of food for its members. Others received portions of the aid for their services, distributing it among relatives or selling it on the open market. Some families charged per-truck fees.

“The families that have become responsible for security operations [...] are basically the same ones that made up the truck-looting system,” the businessmen association source says. Entire clans now control the security business, according to the source, including the Abu Amra, Abu Maghsib, Abu Khammash, Abu Bakra and Louh, all from Gaza’s Bedouin tribes, most notably the Tarabin. Two sellers and a source in the Rafah Chamber of Commerce corroborated this.

Fully equipped and branded with their own logos and flags, the groups established zones of influence. Some began employing members of other families, though the work still ran under the clan’s banner. It became a lucrative business. Under the pressures of unemployment and need, hundreds of young people were drawn into this new business.

Haphazard at first, the business gradually evolved into more structured, institutional forms. And perhaps nowhere was this seen more clearly than with the emergence of Aqsa for Transport, Security and Guarding Services, which entered onto the scene for the first time in late summer 2024.

While clan and tribal members still carry out security work, many now operate under Aqsa’s umbrella. The company’s ability to secure trucks inside Gaza was facilitated by its extended ties to the Tarabin, relying on tribe members for missions that were often armed, according to a source close to Tarabin security personnel in the strip.

These ties allowed the company to secure the movement of goods even through some of the most dangerous areas, including Morag, south of Rafah, controlled by the Abu Shabab group under Israeli military protection. “Aqsa handled the transport of goods from Karam Abu Salem to a designated point about six kilometers west of the crossing, inside the area controlled by Abu Shabab, who is from the Tarabin,” the source in Rafah Chamber of Commerce says. “The company would notify the trader of the delivery time inside that zone.” The fee was $3,500 per truck, according to the source.

At the head of Aqsa’s board of directors is Egyptian national Amr Hadhoud, who is based in Arish.

In 2010, a contracting firm was established in Arish under the name Aqsa Group. As stated on its website, the company describes itself as a provider of “import, export, transport, loading and unloading, customs clearance, logistics and general contracting services.” Its portfolio includes projects such as Gaza’s reconstruction, school construction in the Suez Governorate, the Dabaa nuclear project, the monorail station in Shorouk City and others.

The common thread linking all the projects Aqsa has been involved in is that they all fall under the Organi Group, Argany’s business conglomerate.

Although the Organi Group’s website does not list Aqsa among its subsidiaries, Aqsa has repeatedly asserted the affiliation. During a Ramadan iftar it hosted in March 2024, the company displayed banners stating it was one of Argany’s companies, as seen in a promotional video of the event attended by Argany himself, along with Major General Louay Zamzam, the former Military Intelligence director in North Sinai and now deputy chair of the Misr Sinai for Industrial Development and Investment.

This changed during Aqsa’s Ramadan iftar event this year, where the banners made no reference to Argany. Yet a job posting the company published on its LinkedIn page just a few months ago mentioned that it operates under the Organi Group.

What is certain is that there is a longstanding relationship between Argany and Hadhoud, making the latter a deeply trusted figure and one of Argany’s most important associates.

In addition to living in Arish, Hadhoud’s work has long been tied to the border crossings between Egypt, Gaza and Israel. He began his career at the Rafah crossing in early 2000, working for one of the companies operating there, and then moved through several positions across companies working at Rafah and Awja. He eventually founded Aqsa in 2010, according to two sources close to him who spoke to Mada Masr — one who worked with him at Aqsa and another who worked with him at a company at the crossing.

The relationship between Hadhoud and Argany grew stronger after the 2014 Gaza war and Sons of Sinai's acquisition of a contract for transporting reconstruction material into the strip.

According to the same sources, Hadhoud managed to resolve several supply and transport problems the company faced during Gaza’s post-2014 reconstruction. From that point on, one of the sources says, Hadhoud became “as dear to him as his son Essam.” Aqsa also partnered with Sons of Sinai in reconstruction efforts overseen by Egypt after the 2021 war, a Palestinian engineer who worked at Aqsa before the current war says to Mada Masr.

Yet Hadhoud’s name remained mostly unknown for all these years, until Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza began on October 7, 2023, at which point the company’s main line of work shifted from contracting to aid and security.

Hadhoud’s standing became clear to everyone after an incident in January 2024 that brought him widespread notoriety, according to the two previous sources and a third close to Argany. Hadhoud brandished his personal firearm at an official from Sons of Sinai — a former officer — during a dispute inside the Rafah crossing’s administrative building. He was detained for two days in one of the rooms at the crossing before being released after Argany intervened.

During this period, Argany and his companies had come under intense scrutiny over the fact that he had taken charge of what became known as the “travel coordination” business — coordinating the exit of Palestinians from Gaza for fees that reached as high as $5,000 per person through his company Hala, as Mada Masr reported in an investigation last year. He was also involved in transporting and storing aid and goods moving from the Egyptian side into Gaza.

Since then, Argany and his companies have become globally known, placing him at the top of lists of businessmen accused of profiting from the genocide.

These pressures, according to the analysis of a source close to Argany, pushed him to look for ways to reduce the media scrutiny while continuing business as usual. He found the answer in Aqsa to manage certain activities related to the movement of aid and goods and support Egypt’s official efforts to provide assistance on the Gaza side, the source says.

One of the most prominent elements of these efforts was the establishment of camps for displaced Palestinians inside Gaza. The first of these camps was set up in December 2023 by the Egyptian Red Crescent, “under the directives of the Egyptian political leadership,” as reported by Egyptian media at the time. In addition to shelter tents, the camps provided food, water and electricity.

Hadhoud accompanied Red Crescent teams during the construction of an Egyptian camp in the Mawasi area of Khan Younis. After the camp was completed, its tents set up and displaced families settled in, it remained under the management of the Egyptian Red Crescent for a period, according to a source in the organization. Management was later transferred to the Aqsa company, and the site became known as the Aqsa camp.

During the final quarter of 2024, the Aqsa camp received notable coverage on Egypt’s state-run TV channels, showing Aqsa’s staff distributing Egyptian aid to displaced families in the camp. Egyptian media reports carried messages of gratitude from Gaza’s community leaders to Egypt accompanied by footage of young men wearing Aqsa-branded vests loading aid trucks, and in others, delivering infant formula to hospitals — describing the company as Egypt’s representative for distributing aid inside Palestinian camps, with no mention of the Egyptian Red Crescent.

In November, Extra News pointed to the Aqsa company’s role in securing aid in a video report titled “Egypt continues securing and bringing humanitarian aid trucks into the Gaza Strip.” The video showed Aqsa personnel receiving aid trucks and unloading their cargo at a company-run facility.

With the emergence of the camps, Aqsa reappeared in a new form inside Gaza during the last quarter of 2024 under the name “Aqsa for Transport, Security and Guarding Services.” The connection between the entities was confirmed in January, when an Israeli drone strike hit a vehicle on Salah Eddin Road in Khan Younis, killing five people inside. The car bore a printed emblem on its hood: an eagle with a shield of the Egyptian flag on its chest, beneath which “Arab Republic of Egypt” was written.

Hours after the strike, the Aqsa Group issued a statement mourning the five killed, describing them as “its sons” who were killed “while securing humanitarian aid.” With that statement, it became clear that the Aqsa Group and Aqsa for Transport, Security and Guarding Services were two sides of the same coin, a coin owned by Hadhoud.

By the end of the year, however — and for unknown reasons — references to the Aqsa camp disappeared from Egyptian media coverage. In its place, a new entity emerged: the Egyptian Relief Committee for the People of Gaza, or simply the Egyptian Committee. However, no clear information was provided about the entity to which it is affiliated or the nature of its work. The committee is run by the Abu al-Hussein clan of the Tarabin tribe in Gaza and is chaired by Hayel Abu al-Hussein, the clan’s sheikh (or mukhtar, as they are known in Gaza), who resides in Egypt.

The Egyptian Committee quickly moved to the forefront, reflected in Egyptian media shifting its focus from Aqsa to the committee — though the style of coverage remained identical, featuring tribal leaders voicing praise and gratitude toward Egyptian leadership. The Aqsa Group reshared some of these reports on its own page, making sure to add the hashtag #Aqsa_Group_Companies.

Over these months, Hadhoud evolved from head of the Aqsa company to head of the Aqsa Group, and eventually to chair of the Hadhoud Group. In the process, he added yet another subsidiary: Aqsa Future for Construction and Building.

The company leveraged its administration of the Aqsa camp to play a central role in bringing in, transporting and securing aid and commercial goods. According to a source in the Egyptian Red Crescent, the camp was among the channels used to bring in truckloads of commercial goods labelled as humanitarian aid.

This arrangement continued throughout the ceasefire period early this year until its collapse in March, after which Israel fully halted the entry of aid and goods.

During those months of the ban, Aqsa’s role in shipment security underwent a notable shift. On April 24, a new page appeared under the name “Aqsa Company for Transport, Security and Guarding - Gaza, Palestine.” By mid-2025, it had taken on a more organized form, having become a licensed security company inside the strip, according to the source in the Palestinian Businessmen Association.

As the name suggests, the company’s new branding was an attempt to imply it was a Palestinian entity distinct from its Egyptian counterpart — even though the two share the same name and nearly identical logos, with only a slight change in color. And both companies are run by the same man: Amr Hadhoud.

In practice, this was more than a cosmetic change. It translated into a significant expansion of the company’s operations. Alongside Sons of Sinai’s control of the transport, storage and security of goods on the Egyptian side, Aqsa began taking part in those same activities on the Palestinian side through this new entity — at least in southern Gaza.

During this period, Aqsa also substantially expanded in Arish, building massive warehouses near Arish International Airport and emblazoning them with the company’s logo. These facilities stood alongside warehouses operated by Sons of Sinai and the Egyptian Red Crescent.

Argany and his companies were now poised to manage the flow of goods on both sides of the border, awaiting the reopening for aid and commercial shipments.

On July 27, aid deliveries into Gaza resumed after months of a deadly blockade and immense international pressure, both popular and official. The resumption came at an extremely critical moment in the strip, where famine was consuming the population, security had collapsed and armed gangs specialized in looting food trucks had proliferated.

But aid distribution at this stage operated under a new system that Palestinians refer to as “self-distribution.” Drivers entered unescorted, without any security protection, and were forced to stop in the Morag area south of Rafah — leaving them exposed to theft and looting.

According to one seller, the Israeli military orders UN aid drivers to stop in predetermined zones so that civilians can seize the goods. If a driver refuses to stop, the military directly targets the truck. UN data shows that out of 6,943 UN aid trucks that entered Gaza from July 27 to the recent ceasefire on October 9, only 1,823 reached their destination — meaning around 75 percent were looted.

Israel, meanwhile, permitted security escorts for all other forms of aid and commercial shipments, whether operated by Palestinian companies or by Sons of Sinai. These convoys entered primarily through the Kissufim crossing in central Gaza, leading to Khan Younis and Deir al-Balah — the areas hosting the largest concentration of displaced Palestinians — and which Israel began operating at the time.

With the resumption, Aqsa for Transport, Security and Guarding returned to the scene with far greater organization and capacity — in personnel, equipment and weaponry, according to the businessmen association source. Securing a single commercial truck cost between $17,000 and $30,000. This added yet another surge to commodity prices — up to 30 times their real price after factoring in security and coordination costs, according to Abu Ramadan.

***

A few days after aid resumed at the end of July, Israel decided to lift its formal ban on importing goods — though only those from the West Bank and Israel. Anything coming from Egypt was still prohibited, according to Abu Ramadan.

All goods were channeled exclusively through the Kissufim crossing, the source at the Rafah Chamber of Commerce says.

Israel relied on a new mechanism for commercial entries, similar to the one used early in the war, but this time limiting permits to just three companies, according to both Abu Ramadan and the Rafah Chamber of Commerce source. The largest and most important of these was Three Brothers, owned by Khazendar, the Palestinian businessman living in Egypt. It had been one of the five companies granted Israeli authorization to import commercial goods during the early months of the war, as Gaza sellers confirm to Mada Masr. According to Abu Ramadan, Khazendar is the only importer in the strip capable of bringing in any goods from anywhere.

The apparent reason lies in Khazendar’s good relationship with Israel. A Financial Times report published in late May noted that Israel had tried to persuade several prominent Palestinian businessmen to work with the GHF, but many refused due to its notorious reputation. Khazendar was the only one who agreed to participate. It was therefore unsurprising that his company secured near-exclusive rights to coordinate the entry of goods under the new system that began in July — prompting Palestinian condemnations of him, the most notable of which came in a statement attributed to his family publicly disowning him.

Khazendar’s company primarily monopolized goods coordination, with coordination fees soaring to between $200,000 and $300,000 per truck, depending on the type of goods, according to the Rafah Chamber of Commerce source. The “Israeli line” dominated the import of goods.

But this lasted only a few weeks. Soon after, Sons of Sinai resumed bringing goods in through aid convoys, and the “Egyptian line” once again began competing with the “Israeli line.”

According to the source, this competition pushed Sons of Sinai to reduce its coordination fees to between $100,000 and $150,000 per truck — around half of what Khazendar was charging. “Still big sums,” the source says. “They tell you, ‘You pay $300,000 [through the Israeli line], so I’m giving you a discount.’” This lasted throughout the first few weeks.

On top of that, the cost of transporting goods within the strip at the time — from the crossing to traders’ warehouses — ranged from $25,000 to $50,000 per truck, depending on the type of goods, according to two Gaza sellers. Security fees added another $10,000 to $15,000, also depending on the cargo.

All of these costs, along with the huge profits made by traders, ultimately fall on Palestinians who are trying to find any food to stave off hunger for themselves and their families. For instance, coordinating the entry of a single truck carrying frozen chicken (about 25 tons) cost around $200,000 in early August, according to Abu Ramadan. The chicken was then sold in markets for nearly $40 per kg. This means the revenue from selling the contents of just one such truck reached around $1 million.

And no one can object. “If any official body in Gaza decided to expose this trade that exploits starving people, say by holding a press conference, the response would be: ‘fine, if you don’t want it, go starve,’” the Rafah Chamber of Commerce source says. “We’re trapped between a hammer and an anvil.”

This situation persisted until the ceasefire agreement in October, brokered by Egypt, the US and Qatar and followed by a major conference in Sharm el-Sheikh attended by international stakeholders. After that, Israel granted permits to additional companies, eventually bringing the total to 12. This created competition among them, which, combined with the increased flow of aid and goods, helped drive down coordination costs.

But the decrease was not substantial, and the gap between Khazendar’s coordination fees on the Israeli line and Argany’s fees on the Egyptian line remained. Posts by a Gaza-based trading company, reviewed by Mada Masr before they were later deleted, showed coordination price lists for various types of goods. Coordinating a truckload of frozen chicken coming from the West Bank and Israel cost around $150,000. By comparison, coordinating the same truckload of frozen chicken entering from Egypt cost $85,000, covering all expenses including land transport, Sons of Sinai’s fees and security. Additional payments could also be made to prioritize a truck’s entry. According to Chamber of Commerce data, the average coordination fee per frozen-chicken truck over the past few months was around $80,000.

Alongside the competition over goods coordination costs, Aqsa continued to dominate the security business, in addition to its transport and shipping operations on the Palestinian side. The company currently charges a fixed $10,000 to secure each truck, according to Gaza traders.

Recently, a new method of importing and transporting goods emerged, known as partial shipping, in which sellers can purchase a single pallet of goods (100 cm wide, 120 cm long and 160 cm high) or even just a single box, according to the Rafah Chamber of Commerce source and two other Gaza sellers. Each pallet costs between $3,000 and $4,000, depending on the type of goods (compared to only $300 before the war.) This partial-sale system ultimately multiplies the profit generated from each truck.

“Let’s say, clothes. If I want to bring an entire truckload directly from Sons of Sinai, I would pay, for example, $50,000,” the Rafah Chamber of Commerce source says. But buying each pallet separately through multiple traders raises the price of the truckload to $150,000.

Meanwhile, Argany’s business is expanding in the strip’s internal import cycles — all the way to selling goods directly to consumers. “Isn’t the profit from coordination enough for them?” the source says. “Now they want the profit from the market too?”