Israel’s partial reopening of the Rafah border crossing, the sole crossing point between Egypt and the Gaza Strip, on Monday was a small step forward but not nearly enough in supporting and rehabilitating the Palestinian enclave’s two million residents.
In the aftermath of the two-year Israel-Hamas war that killed more than 70,000 men, women and children, and destroyed most of the enclave’s built-up areas, ordinary Palestinians find themselves living in utterly desperate conditions and in urgent need of food, water, shelter and medical care.
In such a scenario, the agreed-upon plan – to allow 50 Palestinians to enter Gaza each day and 150, comprising 50 patients and up to two companions with each, to depart it – amounts to mere tokenism. Purportedly taken as a security measure, such a decision will fail to alleviate suffering across the occupied territory.
The reopening had been mandated under the first phase of US President Donald Trump’s Gaza peace plan, following a Washington-brokered ceasefire in October. However, the months-long delay in implementing this step speaks volumes about the power dynamics at play, with Israel having postponed it until the body of the last Israeli hostage in the enclave was recovered on Monday.
In addition to perpetuating Palestinian suffering, Israel’s broader strategy to limit the entry of people and goods into Gaza has had other undesirable consequences.
The first meeting of the Palestinian committee taking interim charge of territory’s daily affairs was delayed last week, with some members unable to travel out of the Strip. But a more adverse impact has been the prevalence of smuggling of goods across the border that Israeli investigators are now looking into, pointing to the Israeli government’s contentious policy of restricting inflows to “essential” supplies only.
Washington’s recent announcement that its peace plan has advanced to its second phase, which entails the reconstruction and demilitarisation of Gaza – including Hamas’s disarmament – appears promising. But much work is needed.
Since October, Israeli forces have regularly violated the truce, killing more than 500 Palestinians – including 32 last weekend. This works directly against the promises made by the US-led Board of Peace, a body tasked with overseeing the peace plan, at Davos last month.
Israeli policies, including bans on a number of aid agencies, highlight the long-standing pattern of its continued control over Palestinian lives. It is Israel that will dictate who and what enters or exits Gaza, maintain an all-pervasive occupation and reserve the right to arbitrarily revoke access.
But rather than taking such harsh and punitive measures, which will only further anger Palestinians in Gaza and other occupied territories, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government should be addressing the humanitarian crisis. It should allow for the full reopening of the Rafah crossing and allow aid groups into Gaza as soon as possible.
In the eyes of the rest of the world, anything less will appear as a deliberate Israeli agenda that makes Palestinian lives as hard as possible.
