A first group of foreigners and citizens with dual nationality arrived in Egypt this Wednesday from the Gaza Strip, after the Israeli bombings on Palestinian territory.
According to an Egyptian official who requested anonymity, this first group is made up of children, women and the elderly, told AFP.
The BBC says at least 20 injured people and 110 foreign and dual nationals arrived in Egypt through the Rafah crossing.
Egyptian television has broadcast images of people getting off buses on the Egyptian side of the Rafah border post, on the border with Gaza, after an exceptional opening was announced to allow the passage of 90 injured Palestinians and around 545 foreigners and citizens. with dual nationality.
The Rafah border is the only entrance and exit to the besieged Palestinian territory that is not in Israeli hands.
The Egyptian authorities have prepared a field hospital to receive injured Palestinians, and serious cases or those requiring additional treatment and special care are transferred to other hospitals.
Palestinian authorities published a list of the names, nationalities and passport numbers of people covered by the exceptional opening of the Rafah border post.
According to foreign diplomats, this list includes citizens of 44 countries, including employees of 28 foreign agencies and organizations located in the Gaza Strip, where 2.4 million people are trying to escape Israel’s intense and successive bombardments.
An AFP correspondent in Egypt observed at least three ambulances entering the Cheikh Zuaid hospital, a dozen kilometers from the Rafah post.
According to Egyptian television, at least three wounded people were taken to the central hospital in Al-Arich, in the province of North Sinai, about 40 kilometers from Rafah.
Located between Israel, Egypt and the Mediterranean Sea, the Gaza Strip, with approximately 360 square kilometers and one of the most densely populated territories in the world, is currently without water, electricity or communications (telephone or internet) and practically without food, after the siege imposed by Israel.
Ashraf al-Qudra, spokesman for the Ministry of Health of the Gaza government, led by the Islamist group Hamas, behind the attacks on Israel that left more than 1,400 dead on October 7, told AFP that a list with more than four thousand people who need health care.
“We hope they can leave in the next few hours, because they need surgical interventions that cannot be performed in Gaza. We must save them,” he appealed.
More than 8,500 people died and thousands more were injured in the bombings with which Israel responded to the attack launched by Hamas, considered a terrorist organization by Israel, the United States and the European Union and which has controlled Gaza since 2007, when it expelled the party from the territory. Fatah, which governs the West Bank.
Israel has been launching airstrikes on Gaza since October 7, when Hamas militants attacked Israeli villages and military posts, killing about 1,400 people and taking 240 hostages.
Israeli forces have also stepped up operations in the West Bank, occupied since the 1967 Arab-Israeli war.
According to the Ramallah-based Health Ministry, at least 122 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli forces or settlers in the West Bank since October 7.
Source: TSF
