Hell Gate " Rafah Crossing "

                                                       Photo:Zouheir alNajjar

Citizens of Gaza strip suffer from the siege imposed over them by the Egyptian and Israeli authorities years ago.2016 marks ten years of Israeli siege.
 Ali,42 years old man from Gaza ,left to Europe."I reached Belgium in 2014 after a long journey of death through the sea,escaping from the illegal blockade of Gaza",said Ali.
Ali is a father for six children waiting a long their mother to cross from Rafah border towards Egypt to fly to their father in Belgium to be united again.
"Its unbelievable ,I booked my family flight tickets as they were supposed to cross the second day to Egypt,but the Egyptian authorities broke their agreement with the authorities in Gaza and didn't allow any bus to cross the following day,where I lost the tickets money too", said Ali.
 Its noteworthy that the Egyptian authorities was supposed to open the Rafah border on both sides for 2 days on 11 and 12 May.On the first day ,the Egyptian authorities allowed 7 buses to cross after a continues humiliation for the Palestinian side as usual.
I was in touch with Ali before the border opening announcement. He gave me a call and was happy that his is coming with his children." I booked their flight tickets as they are going to cross the second day,their names on the list,I am happy that will meet and reunite again",said Ali while he was full of happiness and did not realize that this happiness will turn to sadness.
"Help me ! the Egyptian authorities didnt allow any bus in till now",asked Ali.The Egyptian authorities kept the crossing gate closed till late hours the second day ,claiming that there was a problem with the computers system while in fact there was a dispute between the Palestinian and Egyptian parts.The Egyptian part was keen to let the coordination bus to pass first and the other buses afterwards.
The coordination bus is a bus contains 100 passengers where they pay at least 3 thousand USD to some certain people who are in touch with the Egyptian authorities (intelligence) and crossing officials  ,This money distributed  afterwards among them,where the crossing officials get each opening more than 600 thousand USD from those poor passengers in order to cross.

The Israeli occupation closed all crossings into the territory, keeping only the Erez Crossing open for occasional pedestrian traffic and Kerem Shalom for a few classified and highly-regulated goods. Erez has been used a trap for people trying to cross.

Egypt has been keeping the Rafah Crossing closed for most of the time. In 2015, the crossing was only open for 21 days; just 10,000 Palestinians were allowed through, among them pilgrims, patients and students.Since the beginning of 2016,its only 2 days on last 11 and 12 May where the crossing opened.Its noteworthy that there are more than 100 thousand persons including patients,students and families waiting for joining their families 

Palestinian ministry of health in Gaza has since been reporting chronic shortages of medicines and hospital disposables. “Shelves are empty due to the restrictions imposed by the Israelis on people and goods going in and out of the coastal enclave,” MOH spokesman says.

" I paid thousands of Dollars to let my family cross from Gaza to Egypt through the coordination bus in the next opening of the crossing",said Abo Ahmed,a Palestinian refugee living in Belgium waiting for his to reunite again.

Abo Ahmed,tried to bring his family through the normal procedures and list but in vain,as there thousands of people registered their names to cross from Rafah crossing but its a long list ,but the only way now is to pay thousands for Dollars through the brokers to register his family in the coordination bus.

Attempt to break the siege

The plight of the Palestinians in Gaza has aroused widespread popular support across the world and many attempts have been made to break the siege by sea.

Although a few small boats made the trip in the first few years, later and more ambitious attempts were stopped in international waters by the Israeli navy, often violently.

In May, 2010, for example, the Israeli commandos intercepted the Freedom Flotilla. Nine Turkish citizens were killed in the assault and a number of others were wounded; one died in 2014 as a direct result of his wounds. The ships were towed into and Israeli port and everyone on board was arrested.

During the siege, the Israeli occupation has launched four major military offensives against the people of Gaza, in 2006, 2008/9, 2012 and 2014; the latter was the most destructive. It lasted for 51 days and whole areas of Gaza were flattened by Israeli bombs; tens of thousands of people were displaced.

The strict siege and wars have shattered the Palestinian economy in Gaza, economic commentator Maher al-Tabaa told Quds Press. “The unemployment rate in Gaza stands at 42 per cent, with the blockade deepening the economic crisis,” he explained.

According to the International Monetary Fund, the unemployment rate in Gaza is the highest in the world and there are more than 200,000 unemployed people in Gaza.

Many international organisations have issued similar warnings due to the effects of the oppressive Israeli measures, which are regarded as collective punishment and are illegal in international law.

Thousands of Palestinians waiting for the next opening of the crossing with hope to join families abroad,students to get back to their universities.patients to get their cure in the hospitals.They are full of hope that the crossing will open by the holy month of Ramadan.

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Some of the information in the article from Days of Palestine

Kerry urges Hamas to accept Gaza truce offer

S Secretary of State John Kerry has called on the Palestinian group, Hamas, to accept a ceasefire along the lines of an Egyptian proposal, to end the raging Gaza conflict that has already killed at least 607 Palestinians and 29 Israelis. The top US diplomat spoke in Cairo on Tuesday after meeting Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, whose government offered the ceasefire proposal last week, which calls for both Israel and Hamas to accept an immediate ceasefire and dispatch envoys to Cairo for further negotiations. The Palestinian leadership has proposed to Egypt a plan for a ceasefire to be followed by five days of negotiations to stop the fighting, Palestinian official Azzam al-Ahmed told reporters in Cairo on Tuesday. "My message is the same for Israelis and Palestinians: Stop fighting, start talking and take on the root causes of the conflict so that we are not at the same situation in the next six months or a year," he said.Kerry's call comes as United Nations chief Ban Ki-moon met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Tel Aviv to discuss how to stop the ongoing bloodshed and begin negotiating. In response, Netanyahu said, "we will do what we need to do to defend ourselves". The Israeli prime minister said that the international community must hold Hamas accountable for consistently rejecting multiple ceasefire proposals. Blockade of Gaza For Hamas, the root cause is the siege of Gaza, and it has consistently demanded that Israel and Egypt lift the blockade. It also wants the release of dozens of prisoners who were freed in a 2011 swap for captured Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit but re-arrested this summer. "The conditions for a ceasefire are... a full lifting of the blockade and then the release of those recently detained in the West Bank," its leader in Gaza, Ismail Haniya, said on television. "We cannot go backwards, to a slow death," he said, referring to the Israeli blockade in force since 2006. Israel has little interest in making concessions to the Palestinian group, however. The flurry of diplomatic activities also comes as Israeli military reported that one of its soldiers is missing in Gaza and is presumed dead. Israel's Channel 10 News reported earlier on Tuesday that the military believed the soldier, identified as Oron Shaul, was killed along with six other troops in an attack on an armoured vehicle on Sunday. However, the army has only identified six bodies. "If a soldier has been captured, this will deal a blow to the Israeli army," Al Jazeera's Kim Vinnell, reporting from West Jerusalem, said. "It would give Palestinian fighters a significant leverage in the conflict," she said. Intesified bombardment The deadliest conflict in five years between Israel and the Palestinians has killed more than 600 Palestinians, many of them civilians, according to Gaza's Health Ministry. At least 29 Israelis, 27 of them soldiers, have died in the fighting. Late on Tuesday, a series of Israeli air strikes across the Gaza Strip killed six people, medics said. An elderly woman and her brother were among those killed in three separate raids targeting Bureij and Al-Maghazi in central Gaza, and Rafah in the south, emergency services spokesman Ashraf al-Qudra told AFP news agency. Earlier in the day, Israeli aircraft and tanks hit more than 150 targets in the Palestinain enclave, including five mosques, a football stadium and the home of the late leader of Hamas' military wing, according to Palestinian police. At least seven Palestinians were reported killed in attacks. Meanwhile, gunshots were fired on Tuesday into Al Jazeera’s bureau in Gaza City. Al Jazeera's Stephanie Dekker said two bullets hit the building. No casualties were reported. Since the Israeli operation began on July 8, huge numbers of Palestinians have fled their homes, with the UN saying more than 100,000 people have sought shelter in 69 schools run by its Palestinian refugee agency, UNRWA.

Source: Al Jazeera and agencies

Liberman threatens to close down al-Jazeera

Just as Britain would not have let Der Stürmer be printed in Britain during World War II, and the US would not allow al-Qaida to broadcast from America, Israel will work to close down al-Jazeera in Israel, Foreign Minister Avigdor Liberman said Monday.

Liberman, speaking at the start of a meeting in Jerusalem with Rwandan Foreign Minister Louise Mushikiwabo, said that Hamas – which he pointed out is funded by Qatar – is a central element in al-Jazeera’s propaganda efforts.

According to Channel 2, Liberman has also recently been calling in private meetings for Israel to assassinate Hamas head Khaled Mashaal, saying that Qatar can no longer be a safe refuge for him.

In these discussions, he reportedly pointed out that the US assassinated Osama Bin Laden in a third country: Pakistan.

Israel tried once before to assassinate Mashaal abroad – in a botched attempt ordered by Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu during his first term in 1997.

Regarding Al-Jazeera, Liberman said it “has abandoned even the perception of being a reliable news organization and broadcasts from Gaza and to the world anti-Israel incitement, lies, and encouragement to the terrorists.”

Liberman said the Foreign Ministry has begun examining the news organization’s activities and its status with “the intent of not allowing it to broadcast anymore from Israel.”

Liberman noted that the the largest networks broadcast from Israel, and “a not insubstantial number of them do not exactly broadcast Zionist propaganda.” Nevertheless, he said, Israel is a democratic state where this is possible and permitted.

However, in the case of of al-Jazeera, he said, this is not a matter of journalism but rather “a matter of the activity of an arm of a terrorist organization that is fighting this minute against Israel.”

One senior government official said he is not aware of any serious discussion to close al-Jazeera.

Another official said that closing al-Jazeera would necessitate a court case in which it would be necessary to persuade the court that the network is endangering national security.

“Saying they lie or are impartial will not be enough,” the official said.

The official said Liberman’s comments about al-Jazeera were reminiscent of his calls last month for a Foreign Ministry meeting to discuss expelling the UN’s Middle East envoy, Robert Serry. The meeting itself grabbed headlines, but nothing substantial followed.

Liberman also said that al-Jazeera’s sponsor, Qatar, has “turned into a world problem.”

The foreign minister said Qatar is the “economic backbone” of the most extreme terrorist organizations destabilizing the world and the Middle East.

“Qatar is also a central actor in the confrontation we are now conducting with Hamas in Gaza,” he said, “since it funds Hamas and gives refuge to Mashaal.”