"Egypt starts herding Palestinians back into Gaza prison"
Egyptian riot police began controlling Palestinians flooding from the Gaza Strip Thursday, stopping some from moving deeper into Egypt. Hosni Mubarak said he will seal up the prison again. Palestinians are not being allowed to travel further south than El-Arish.
Helmeted officers with dogs used batons to beat the hoods of Egyptian cars and trucks offering rides to Palestinians seeking goods in towns out of walking range.
Dozens of Egyptian guards pushed their way through the crowds but did not (yet) halt the thousands of Palestinians walking over the wreckage of the prison wall.
U.S. and Arab officials said Wednesday that Egypt had assured the United States it would soon get the prison wall rebuilt.
An Arab diplomat said Egypt told the United States it expected the Palestinians' exodus from Gaza to end by midday Thursday, but a senior U.S. official said Egypt has not been precise about when it will start forcing Palestinians back into the prison.
"Everyone is rushing into Egypt before they seal it off," said Mohammed Abu Amra, a Palestinian man walking with crutches. "The Egyptians started doing good deeds by letting us in. For God's sake, why don't they keep allowing us to pass through?"
JEWS RETALIATE BY BREAKING THEIR PROMISE
Earlier this week, Jews said they would send emergency shipments of fuel to Gaza today. The fuel is needed to run Gaza City's power plant, which had shut down after Jews imposed a complete closure on the Gaza prison last week. On Thursday the Jews said they would send no fuel.
In downtown Rafah, (outside the Gaza prison) Palestinians bought cows, camels and horses, and led them back through the passage into Gaza. Men with electronics equipment struggled to step through the broken opening.
Private trucks ferried Palestinians deeper into Egyptian territory, while others carted cement bags, motorcycles, generators, gasoline jerry cans and canned food toward Gaza to be unloaded and handed over the border.
Several Egyptian armored vehicles towed cars away from a lot on the Egyptian side of the border, attaching ropes to empty pickups and dragging them hundreds of yards away.
Egyptian police were also deployed on main shopping thoroughfares and in alleyways in Rafah, but they did not (yet) attempt to force Palestinians to leave the city.
HAMAS PLANNED THE BREAKOUT A MONTH AGO
Hamas used blowtorches to weaken the wall a month ago. At 2:00 am on Wednesday, masked operatives used 17 explosive charges to tear down the border wall — erected by Jews in 2001 when Jews still lived in Gaza.
Hamas government spokesman Taher Nunu suggested Thursday that Hamas would seek a role in a future on the Gaza-Egypt border.
"An open border like this has no logic," he said. "We are studying the mechanism of having an official crossing point."
Egypt and the Jews will not let Hamas control any crossing point.
Palestinians know they will be imprisoned again, so they are stocking up as best they can.
"We just want freedom," said Adel Tildani, who was bringing his mother-in-law from Egypt into Gaza to meet grandchildren she had never seen before. "I don't need to buy anything. Freedom is more important."
Hamdi al-Masri returned from Egypt to Gaza with several canisters of diesel fuel. He had walked more than six miles to reach an Egyptian town where fuel was not sold out.
Egyptian Ahmed Talaat, 23, crossed into Gaza to visit a sister he had not seen in six years. The town of Rafah was divided in two when Israel captured the Gaza Strip in the 1967 Middle East war, and crossing the border has become increasingly difficult over the years.
Last night, Israeli tanks entered the northern part of Gaza and razed an area where Jews claim that Qassam rockets came from. (Most of the crude homemade rockets have been fired at Sderot, a Jewish town built on the ruins of an ethnically cleansed Palestinian town.) Jews shot and killed a Palestinian who fired an anti-tank missile at them.
