Rafah’s border crossing opened its doors for the first time in almost nine months to allow sick and injured Palestinian patients from Gaza to go to Egypt for medical treatment abroad.
The Gaza Ministry of Health said on Saturday a group of 50 patients, accompanied by 61 caregivers, crossed by Rafah to reach Egypt.
Egyptian television has shown that the ambulances of the Palestinian Red Cross stopping to the crossing door, and several children were brought back to civilians and transferred to ambulances on the Egyptian side.
Many patients suffer from chronic diseases, including cancer, and could not obtain treatment during the War of Israel at 15 months.
A total of 400 Palestinians will be allowed to leave Gaza as part of a ceasefire agreement between Hamas and Israel on January 19.
The reopening of Rafah’s crossing represents an important breakthrough which strengthens the agreement. Israel agreed to reopen the crossing after Hamas released the last living captives in Gaza.
The opening of the key border crossing also came to the heels of Hamas releasing three Israeli captives in Gaza earlier Saturday in exchange for more than 180 Palestinian prisoners detained in Israeli prisons.
‘I hope the number will increase’
Mohammed Zaqout, director of hospitals at the Gaza Ministry of Health, said that more than 6,000 Palestinian patients were ready to be evacuated abroad and that at least 12,000 patients had an urgent need for treatment.
He said that the small numbers that should be evacuated will not cover the need, “and we hope that the number will increase”.
Arwa Damon, founder of the International Network For Aid, Relief and Assistance (INAARA), described the “laborious” process in Tel Aviv Tribune to take around 2,500 Palestinian children requiring vital medical care in Gaza.
She said that the parents or the tutors of a child asked for a medical evacuation. Then, the Ministry of Health in Gaza reviews the cases and puts patients into categories depending on the urgency.
“Then there is a whole coordination effort that must occur with Israel eraaring each of the names that require to be evacuated,” added Damon.
“And then, you need the entire mechanism that is coordinated with the WHO to bring out the children from Gaza, then in the third country agreed to receive them for medical treatment.”
Damon said that “has always been extraordinarily painful” and a “very slow” process which “simply failed to obtain medical treatment for all those who need it”.
In the 15 -month -old genocide of Israel on the enclave after the attack on Hamas, on October 7, 2023, the Gaza health sector was decimated, leaving most of the hospitals outside the operation.
Tens of thousands of Palestinians injured by the bombing of Israel and the ground offensives suffered due to a lack of appropriate medical care.
Israeli forces closed Rafah’s crossing in May 2024 after having seized it. Egypt has followed suit by closing its side of the passage to protest.
Even before the Gaza War, the Palestinians relied on the level crossing, regularly apply for permission to travel outside the territory for rescue treatments not available in the enclave, including chemotherapy.
The management of the crossing has been mired with complexities.
Israel has long accused Hamas of using its border control to bring weapons – an affirmation that Egypt has denied. Israel also refused to allow the Palestinian Authority (PA) to officially resume the management of the crossing.
Instead, the level crossing will be made up of Gaza Palestinians who previously served as border officers with AP, but they will not be allowed to carry official AP insignia, a European diplomat said The Associated Press news agency, under the cover of anonymity.
The European Union monitors will also be present, as before 2007.
“He will support the staff of Palestinian borders and will allow the transfer of people from Gaza, including those who need medical care,” Kaja Kallas wrote to the EU foreign policy, referring to X, referring to his mission monitoring at level passage.