A Palestinian woman of German origin presents her German passport at the Rafah border crossing between the Gaza Strip and Egypt on Saturday. The crossing remains closed, but provides a potential route for foreign passport holders to leave Gaza and for the entry of humanitarian supplies as the Middle East crisis deepens.
Hatem Ali/AP
hide caption
toggle caption
Hatem Ali/AP
A Palestinian woman of German origin presents her German passport at the Rafah border crossing between the Gaza Strip and Egypt on Saturday. The crossing remains closed, but provides a potential route for foreign passport holders to leave Gaza and for the entry of humanitarian supplies as the Middle East crisis deepens.
Hatem Ali/AP
I made dozens of reporting trips to the Gaza Strip, mostly because something terrible was happening. But there was a moment when the mood was optimistic.
It was in November 2005, at the Rafah border crossing, at the southern end of Gaza, the gateway to the Egyptian Sinai Peninsula. Today, dusty and tattered, Rafah is part of the latest crisis in the Middle East. But at the time, it was a small glimmer of hope.
Israel recently withdrew all its settlers and soldiers from Gaza and the Palestinians are taking control of the Rafah border crossing, an important practical and symbolic step.
“I think every Palestinian now has their passport in their pocket,” said Mahmoud Abbas, who was then and still is president of the Palestinian Authority. “Let them come through this terminal whenever they want.”
For the first time in nearly four decades, Palestinians could come and go from a densely populated Gaza Strip without having to pass through Israeli security. Rafah is the only crossing point in Gaza that is not connected to Israel, which controlled all entry and exit points from Gaza – including Rafah – after capturing the territory in the 1967 Arab-Israeli War .
This was the promise of the Rafah crossing. The reality has been extremely disappointing over the past 18 years.
Israeli troops were no longer in Gaza. But the Israeli army and Hamas militants fought at long range, with Hamas firing rockets at Israel and Israel responding with airstrikes. They are now leading the most intense battles in their history.
Egypt, concerned about the repercussions of the unrest in Gaza on its country, has often made it difficult for Gazans to pass through Rafah, particularly young men from Gaza.
Palestinians wait at the Rafah border crossing at the southern tip of Gaza, hoping to cross into Egypt on Monday. Negotiations to open the passage, at least partially, are underway.
Fatima Chbair/AP
hide caption
toggle caption
Fatima Chbair/AP
Palestinians wait at the Rafah border crossing at the southern tip of Gaza, hoping to cross into Egypt on Monday. Negotiations to open the passage, at least partially, are underway.
Fatima Chbair/AP
A refuge for smugglers
The border crossing divides the town of Rafah into two, one part on the Gaza side and another on the Egyptian side. Many on one side have parents on the other. When the crossing is open, Gazans travel to Egypt for vacation, to study or to receive medical treatment.
But more often than not, the border has been closed or heavily restricted.
Rafah has long attracted smugglers, who have dug tunnels under the border, with some entry and exit points emerging inside homes on both sides of the border.
In quiet times, smugglers smuggled in cigarettes and other goods to avoid taxes. In recent years, Hamas has used the tunnels to amass an arsenal of weapons, including some of those used in the October 7 surprise attack in southern Israel that killed more than 1,400 Israelis. More than 2,600 Palestinians have also died in the fighting.
The original Rafah tunnels expanded into the elaborate underground network that Hamas has established beneath Gaza today. Many Hamas members are now believed to be hiding in the tunnels as the territory prepares for what is expected to be a major Israeli ground incursion.
A possible opening
As US Secretary of State Antony Blinken shuttled between Middle Eastern capitals, he appeared to have negotiated at least a partial opening of the Rafah crossing for Monday morning.
Hundreds of foreign nationals, including many Palestinian-Americans, lined up on the Gaza side hoping that their passports would allow them to leave. On the Egyptian side, trucks carrying water, food, fuel and other humanitarian supplies were waiting to enter Gaza.
However, Israel denied reports that it would allow aid from Egypt, saying it believed it would be used by Hamas. Hamas has ruled Gaza since 2007, when it seized power in a bloody battle with its Palestinian rival, Fatah, the party of President Abbas.
“Israel has not agreed to provide any humanitarian aid to Hamas,” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said in a statement on Monday.
The territory’s more than 2 million inhabitants lack all basic products. Many residents heeded Israel’s warning and fled the northern part of Gaza, where Israeli troops massed outside the border, towards the southern end of the territory.
This raises the possibility that large numbers of Palestinians may want to leave Gaza. However, many Palestinians fear that if they leave, they will not be allowed to return. Additionally, Egypt has a long history of keeping the border closed in times of crisis because it now wants to see a flood of refugees pouring into its territory. .
That promising moment from 2005 is long gone.
At the time, I spoke with Attallah Abu Assi, 65, who was among 15 members of his family trying to reach Egypt to visit relatives. Over the previous five years, he said his family had tried about 30 times to pass through Rafah, but were always turned away.
“Even if we have to wait until tomorrow, it is still a happy day because of all the obstacles we have faced,” he said.