GAZA: Israel on Monday reopened the Rafah crossing to a trickle of Palestinians for the first time in months, a major step in a US-backed plan to end the war, though strict Israeli security checks slowed the process.
The Rafah crossing, standing amidst rubble and ruins, is the sole route in or out for nearly all of Gaza's more than 2 million residents.
It was largely shut for most of the war, and reopening it to allow even limited access to the outside world is one of the last steps required under the initial phase of a US-brokered ceasefire reached in October.
The crossing reopened around 9 am on Monday morning. Some 50 Palestinians had been expected to enter the enclave with a similar number exiting. Many of those seeking to depart are hospital patients awaiting specialised medical care outside Gaza.
By nightfall, Israel had permitted 12 Palestinians to re-enter the enclave, Palestinian and Egyptian sources said. A further 38 had not cleared security and would wait on the Egyptian side of the crossing overnight, they said.
In terms of those exiting, Israel permitted five patients escorted by two relatives each to cross to the Egyptian side, the sources said.
That brought the total number entering and exiting to 27. Palestinian officials blamed delays on Israeli security checks. Israel's military had no immediate comment.
Some 20,000 Gazans are hoping to leave Gaza for treatment abroad. Despite the slow reopening, many of them said the step brought relief.
"The crossing is a lifeline for Gaza; it is the lifeline for us, the patients," said Moustafa Abdel Hadi, 32, who receives kidney dialysis at Al Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in central Gaza.
"We want to be treated in order to return to live our normal life."
Israel seized the border crossing in May 2024, about seven months into the Gaza war. Since then, it has largely been closed apart from a brief period during an earlier truce in early 2025.
Reopening the crossing was one of the requirements under the October ceasefire that outlined the first phase of US President Donald Trump's plan to stop fighting between Israel and Hamas.
In January, Trump declared the start of the second phase, where the sides would negotiate the shattered enclave's future governance and reconstruction.
Even as the crossing reopened, Israeli strikes killed at least four Palestinians on Tuesday, including a three-year-old boy, in separate incidents in the north and south of the Strip. The Israeli military had no immediate comment on the incidents. - AFP
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