Palestinian police recently seized 100 Israeli prepaid SIM cards smuggled from Israel into the West Bank.

Police discovered the cards, which were hidden inside a vehicle, June 27 in the city of Dura. Smuggled SIM cards have cost the Palestinian economy dearly, and in April 2017, the Palestinian public prosecutor barred all shops and telecom services in the West Bank from acquiring and selling Israeli prepaid cards.

“The Israeli SIM cards have cost the Palestinian economy losses ranging between $450 million and $1 billion over the past three years," Suleiman al-Zuhairi, undersecretary of the Palestinian Ministry of Telecom and Information Technology, told Al-Monitor. "The Palestinian Authority [PA] has lost about 90 million shekels [about $25 million] a year in taxes that were supposed to go to the Palestinian treasury. The Israeli telecom companies do not pay any taxes or have any financial obligations toward the PA in return for the services they sell to Palestinian consumers.”

Israeli telecom companies have strong mobile signals, using boosters set up across the Israeli settlements in the West Bank, which improves reception on Palestinian mobile phones.