Afrasianet - Dr. Hani Al-Akkad - The Rafah land crossing has finally been opened after nearly two years of closure due to the war on Gaza, Israel's occupation of the crossing, the destruction of large parts of it, the control of the occupation forces over the so-called "Philadelphia Axis", the prevention of the movement of Palestinians, foreigners and Egyptians residing in Gaza from traveling, and the prevention of the entry of aid from medical and relief materials to the Palestinian citizen and the imposition of its entry under strict measures from other Israeli crossings, the most important of which is the Israeli "Kerem Shalom crossing", which is run by Israel.
By opening the crossing, which has become a big issue that may be bigger than all the issues of the conflict, because Israel also wants it to divert attention from the most important issues of the conflict and the entitlements of the establishment of a Palestinian state by implementing the two-state solution, which the whole world recognizes as the best solution to the conflict, and it is the solution capable of achieving comprehensive security and stability not only in Palestine but in the rest of the countries of the region.
Gaza has been turned into a big prison as a result of this great and brutal war, a prison that divides the Gaza Strip into two halves for the displaced and another called the Yellow Line, controlled by Israel and where its forces are stationed, a prison surrounded by high barbed wire, dogs, guards, guns, tanks, and reconnaissance planes roaming the sky with the noise of which says that the war is still ongoing and has not ended, a prison without gates, windows and exits, a prison that is bombed every day and where the martyrs rise. It is the largest prison in history, in which nearly 2 million people are detained living in difficult and complex humanitarian conditions, their homes have been demolished, their fields have been razed away, their roads, streets, schools, universities, hospitals and everything that enables them to live normally, and they are now in tents without any basic services, infrastructure, health care, or education that will save their generations from an unknown fate.
The opening of the Rafah crossing as part of the second phase of the ceasefire agreement in Gaza according to President Trump's plan signed in Sharm el-Sheikh last year, although the opening of the crossing without restrictions for arrivals and departures and the entry of aid into Gaza was one of the terms of the first phase of the agreement, Israel pretended that it would not receive all its hostages from Hamas, and it was conditional on the opening of the crossing to receive the last hostage or body from Gaza, and as soon as Israel returned the body of the last hostage from Gaza He even announced that it would decide to open the Rafah crossing soon, and therefore Mr. Nickolay Mladenov announced that he had reached an agreement with the Israelis to open the Rafah crossing without specifying a day, but the expectations were that it was a matter of a day or two.
The agreement on the mechanism for opening the Rafah crossing was a complicated issue between Israel and Egypt because Israel wanted Egypt not to specify the number of departures in exchange for determining the number of arrivals to Gaza, and said that it would not allow more than 150 Palestinian citizens to reach the Gaza crossing.
Gaza and here the names of those coming to the Shin Bet through Egypt must be sent 24 hours in advance and with the approval they can pass through the crossing, but it will set up a personal checkpoint for those coming after the last inspection by the Palestinian police and the European Union mission to make sure that from the arrival of the crossing, they do not smuggle any weapons into the Gaza Strip, as if it was not satisfied with all the modern electronic search procedures at the crossing, and I think that this checkpoint of the Shin Bet will complicate the free access of Palestinians to Gaza and may be part of the procedures. This checkpoint may constitute a human trap like the one Israel is setting up at the gates of cities in the West Bank .
Perhaps the opening of the Rafah land crossing today is not for goods or aid because it works in the experimental model and the work of the crossing will be expanded in the coming days after weeks or months according to promises, but now the crossing is initially allocated to a limited number of individuals wishing to leave Gaza, most of whom are sick from medical transfer lists, who are waiting to be discharged for treatment abroad, and most of them are wounded in the barbaric war, and those who need urgent surgical intervention, which is not available in the Gaza Strip's hospitals, which are now operating in extreme conditions.
In the complexity of the acute shortage of the required medical materials, equipment and expertise, as for the issue of allowing international news agencies and journalists in the world to enter to cover the effects of the war in Gaza, I do not think that this is available in the initial stage, and this requires special clarity from the Israeli authorities.
The Interim National Committee for the Administration of the Gaza Strip decided to move to the Gaza Strip with all its members to take over the government in Gaza, thus handing over all the files that achieve administrative and security control over the Gaza Strip and imposing a real security situation that allows the Gaza Strip to be prepared for an early recovery in preparation for the reconstruction of the Gaza Strip according to plans that achieve urgent shelter for more than two million displaced people living in tents that do not protect them from the cold of winter or the heat of summer and do not provide them with the minimum requirements of a decent life.
Perhaps the arrival of the committee to administer governance in Gaza must Coinciding with the Israeli withdrawal from the Yellow Line, the arrival of the International Stabilization Force and the deployment of Palestinian police to achieve security, without this, the National Committee for the Administration of Gaza may not be able to work normally in the Gaza Strip, because the Hamas rule is supposed to end completely and there are no security personnel left for it, and therefore all the security and police elements that are in charge of achieving security and stability in the Gaza Strip must work under the command of the Ministry of Interior file official in the National Committee for the Management of the Strip.
The gate of the Great Prison, which is Gaza, which is topped by barbed wire, has been opened and leads to a corridor surrounded by barbed wire and corridors surrounded by high fences of wire, through which travelers pass to and from the Gaza Strip, suggesting from the first glance that Gaza is a war zone and there may be no human life in it, and suggests that Gaza is a desert land that has never had buildings or residents, and then transports travelers to harsh harassment and search and investigation procedures.
What is happening now through Rafah Perhaps this gate, which was opened today to travelers, will not achieve the required freedom for the residents of the Gaza Strip, as their travel is restricted and their access to their lands from abroad is subject to harsh Israeli conditions that may prevent thousands of citizens from reaching and thus Israel achieves full control over the largest open prison in the world. It also achieves soft displacement in a malicious Israeli manner.
The fact is that the Rafah crossing is a border crossing that meets the conditions of the major ports between countries, and the 2005 agreement may be an agreement to consider the crossing as an international artery that connects Palestinians in Gaza to the outside world and allows them to move without restrictions or measures created by the occupation only to maintain some kind of security control over the crossing, even though the agreement says that Israel has the right only to electronic surveillance, and this is now being achieved only for those leaving the Gaza Strip.
