Blinken says Rafah border crossing to reopen, US working on aid delivery
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Palestinians with dual citizenship waiting outside the Rafah border crossing with Egypt on Oct 14, in the hope of getting permission to leave Gaza.
PHOTO: REUTERS
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CAIRO – United States Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Sunday that the Egyptian-controlled border crossing into Gaza would reopen and the US was working with Egypt, Israel and the United Nations to get assistance through it.
Hundreds of tonnes of aid from several countries have been waiting in Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula for days pending a deal for their safe delivery to Gaza.
Some foreign passport holders are also waiting to evacuate from Gaza via the Rafah crossing.
Egypt said it had stepped up diplomatic efforts to break the impasse.
“We have put in place, Egypt has put in place a lot of material support for people in Gaza, and Rafah will be reopened,” Mr Blinken told reporters in Cairo after what he said was a “very good conversation” with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi.
“We are putting into place – with the UN, with Egypt, with Israel, with others – the mechanism by which to get the assistance in and to get it to the people who need it,” he added.
On Sunday, the US appointed veteran diplomat David Satterfield as Special Envoy for Middle East Humanitarian Issues to lead the US response to the Gaza humanitarian crisis.
Mr Sisi told Mr Blinken, who is on a Middle East tour, that Israel had responded disproportionately by launching its heaviest strikes in retaliation for a devastating incursion by Hamas on Oct 7.
“The reaction went beyond the right to self-defence, turning into collective punishment for 2.3 million people in Gaza,” Mr Sisi said.
He added that cooperation was necessary to fight extremism, but also that Jews had in the past lived freely in the Middle East.
“Perhaps targeting has happened in Europe... in other countries, but in our Arab and Islamic countries this did not happen,” he said.
Israeli bombardments on the Gaza side of the Rafah crossing into Egypt, the main crossing out of Gaza not controlled by Israel, have hindered its operability, Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry told CNN last Saturday.
The US told its citizens in Gaza on Saturday they should move closer to the crossing in case it opened.
Mr Shoukry added that if foreign nationals were able to cross the border, Egypt would help them travel home.
Trucks carrying humanitarian aid to Palestinians waiting to enter Gaza on Oct 14.
PHOTO: REUTERS
An earlier Sunday statement from Mr Sisi’s office, issued after a meeting of the national security council, said Egypt rejected any plan to displace Palestinians to the detriment of other countries and that Egypt’s own security was a red line.
Like other Arab states, it said Palestinians should stay on their lands and that it is working to deliver aid.
Mr Sisi also proposed hosting a summit to discuss the crisis, according to the statement.
Eight planes laden with aid from Turkey, the United Arab Emirates, Jordan, Tunisia and the World Health Organisation have landed in Sinai’s Al Arish Airport in recent days and a convoy of more than 100 trucks is waiting in the city for permission to enter Gaza, according to the Egyptian Red Crescent. REUTERS
