Last update - 00:00 19/07/2007
Egypt opens shelters in Sinai to house stranded Palestinians
By News Agencies
Egypt opened shelters on Thursday to house hundreds of Palestinians stranded at the closed border with the Gaza Strip for fear that some could resort to sleeping on the streets, an Egyptian official said.
Border guards and police patrolling the Egyptian border were put on alert over concern that Palestinians in Gaza would blow holes in a border wall to allow those stranded to return home.
The Rafah crossing point into Gaza has been largely shut since June 9, shortly before Hamas Islamists routed Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah movement and took control of the territory.
The Egyptian Red Crescent estimates that roughly 5,000 Palestinians are stranded in dusty Egyptian towns in north Sinai. Many of those have been living in cramped, low-budget hotel rooms or sleeping on mats on the floor in bare concrete shelters as their money runs out.
Ahmed Abdel Hamid, the governor of northern Sinai, told reporters that the government had set up seven shelters in schools, military camps and a youth shelter in el-Arish that could house 900 Palestinians.
"These centers have opened now ... They were opened after some Palestinians ran out of money to guard against them sleeping in the streets," Abdel Hamid said.
He said meals would be served on a daily basis to Palestinians living in the shelters, but the authorities had so far only managed to raise part of the necessary funds.
Local public hospitals had also been instructed to treat stranded Palestinians for free, Abdel Hamid said. He added that more schools could be used to house Palestinians.
Egyptian officials say that most of the stranded Palestinians are Gazans who sought medical treatment abroad, although some were holidaymakers.
Although Palestinian and Egyptian officials technically control the crossing, it can be blocked by Israel.
Gazans protest border closed to relatives trapped inside Egypt
About 2,000 people protested at the Rafah border terminal on Thursday, demanding the crossing be opened to allow the return of thousands of Palestinians stranded in Egypt.
Health conditions have become a concern because many Palestinians stranded in Egypt went there for medical treatment.
"This crossing must be opened," said Salah Hassanen, a local leader from Islamic Jihad, one of the groups organizing the protest. "It's a Palestinian crossing. Our people, our relatives are dying on the other side."
Waving flags and banners reading "Open the crossing" and "Rafah is our only gateway," the protesters requested the crossing be opened and complained of health problem among relatives stuck on the other side.
About 6,000 Palestinians are waiting on the Egyptian side of the crossing, according to the Palestinian Ministry of Information. Most are staying with relatives, in mosques, at an airport or in rented houses. Some 30,000 others are waiting elsewhere in Egypt, the ministry said.
The Palestinian Health Ministry said 25 Palestinians who left Gaza for medical treatment have died in Egypt while waiting to return. Their bodies were returned to Gaza through coordination with Israel.
Most recently, the body of a 28-year-old woman who went to Egypt for chemotherapy was returned to Gaza on Tuesday through Kerem Shalom, a border crossing controlled by Israel.
Fatima Olwan, 52, said her daughter Sana, 29, went to Egypt for eye surgery and is now stuck on the other side with three children.
"She's running out of money," Olwan said. "Her children are sick from the hot weather and I'm afraid that she's going to have side effects from the laser surgery."
Israel has proposed rerouting the stranded Palestinians through Kerem Shalom crossing, near the meeting point of Gaza, Egypt and Israel.
Egypt has supported the idea, but Hamas has rejected it, saying travelers must be allowed to return through Rafah, which is not controlled by Israel.
Olwan saw things differently.
"Open Kerem Shalom or whatever," she said. "I want my daughter to come back."
The Palestinians took control of Rafah under a U.S.-brokered agreement worked out after Israel's pullout from Gaza in 2005. Under the deal, Israeli agreed to allow security forces from Abbas' Fatah movement to operate the crossing under EU supervision. The agreement broke down after Fatah forces were ousted from Gaza.