Abdel-Fatah el-Sissi
…El-Sissi’s announcement is not expected to ease the lengthy, complicated security procedures that turn Palestinians’ trip to the Rafah crossing into a hardship. Egypt’s security and intelligence services haves lists of Palestinians allegedly involved in the Islamic insurgency and anti-government attacks during the 2011 uprising that forced longtime President Hosni Mubarak to step down.
Under the banner of combating terrorism, Egypt began razing the town of Rafah in 2014 and demolished most of the residential buildings nearby except for the southern section to curb underground tunnel smuggling of fighters and weapons. Tens of thousands of Rafah residents have been evacuated. Egypt blamed Hamas for smuggling fighters and weapons into Egypt from Gaza through underground tunnels.
The measures were meant to create a buffer zone as part of Egypt’s efforts to purge northeastern Sinai of Islamic militants following the 2014 Islamic State group bombings that left dozens of soldiers dead. So far, Egypt has created a 5-kilometer (3 mile) buffer zone and is in a process of expanding it to 7 kilometers (4.3 miles).
Besides the buffer zone, Egypt has declared a state of emergency and imposed a curfew across northeastern Sinai including Rafah, which means travelers arriving after 7 p.m. at the crossing have to wait until 6 a.m. the next morning to leave.
The Egyptian army continues to fight Islamic insurgents in northern Sinai.
