By Aryeh Savir/TPS • 28 August, 2019

Israeli authorities at the Kerem Shalom Crossing into the Gaza Strip apprehended a massive shipment of drugs, the Ministry of Defense announced Wednesday.

Officials screening packages before there entry into the Strip found the drugs weighing some five kg in hundreds of bags hidden in a shipment of sports shoes.

The shipment and truck were confiscated, and the police arrested the truck driver and took him for questioning. The driver was identified as a 39-year-old resident of the Bedouin town of Rahat in southern Israel.

Cargo entering Gaza through Israel is meticulously scanned by Israeli officials in search of weapons or materials that can be used for terrorism.

Israel’s combined security agencies have been successful in thwarting thousands of attempts to smuggle illicit materials into the Gaza Strip in the past years.

Smuggling attempts have increased each year since Operation Protective Edge in the summer of 2014.

In many of the incidents, the smuggled materials are meant for Hamas’ rocket production program or its military build-up.