Word: border
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...Rafah Crossing, the Egyptian-controlled entrance to the Gaza Strip. Black-clad Egyptian security forces stand by their trucks, ready if things get out of hand. Aid convoys line up in front of the main gate. Hundreds of Palestinians have already massed before the first checkpoint, yelling at border security in their effort to push through. Off to one side, a group of travelers tries to revive a sick woman who has lost consciousness. Egyptian security look on. Tempers are mounting. This is Day One of a rare three-day border opening...
Rafah is one of only two operating entry/exit points for human traffic into Hamas-held Gaza - the other is Erez on the border with Israel. Gaza, home to an estimated 1.5 million people, has been under Israeli blockade since June, 2007, when Hamas forces routed loyalists of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. Israel, the United States, and the European Union consider Hamas a terrorist organization. (Read "Behind Hamas' Own War on Terror...
...time, a couple of thousand people cross in and out, according to Palestinian human rights monitor Al-Mezan, compared to the tens of thousands who traversed the crossing every month when it was operating regularly. According to a March 2009 report by Gisha, an Israeli rights group that tracks border activity, the sporadic openings at Rafah meet the travel needs of only 3% of Gaza's residents...
...unlucky Palestinians were the foreign passport holders who didn't have Palestinian identification cards. All were born in Gaza, but some had been away for a decade or more. They carried Swiss, German, Spanish, and Australian passports. "No Palestinian ID card, no entry," a border guard shouted back at a Spanish-Palestinian couple who had been pulled off a bus at the checkpoint while their luggage continued on to Gaza. Last year, the couple said they had tried to enter the territory through Erez. They made it into Israel, but were denied entry to Gaza. "I don't want...
...Israeli bulldozer in Gaza in 2003, were also at Rafah Crossing that day, leading a delegation of nine Americans and one Canadian into Gaza to meet with local NGOs and attend the Rachel Corrie Ramadan Football Tournament. They spent two days phoning contacts in Cairo and negotiating with border officials before they were allowed to cross...