Egypt seals last opening on frontier with Gaza

ISRAEL:Egyptian soldiers closed the last opening on the frontier with Gaza yesterday, ending 11 days of unfettered movement for Palestinians in the Israeli-besieged coastal strip. Gazans and Egyptians were permitted to go to their homes but were prevented from crossing into each other's territory.

Hamas police kept order on the Gaza side of the frontier. When Egyptian troops attempted to lay barbed wire along the 11km frontier last Friday, Hamas made a fresh breach with a bulldozer, maintaining the free-for-all begun on January 23rd when activists destroyed Israel's border wall. More than half Gaza's 1.5 million inhabitants crossed into Egypt to buy essential supplies and visit relatives.

Egyptian officials seem to have reached an arrangement with Hamas's Damascus-based politburo chief Khaled Mishaal and Gaza's Mahmoud Zahar, who travelled to Cairo for talks. Dr Zahar said Egypt insisted the border should be closed by yesterday, but observed that Cairo is set to hold discussions with the EU "to allow opening of the gates freely and without preconditions".

The southern Rafah terminal for human traffic closed when EU monitors, deployed under a 2005 agreement, withdrew last June after Hamas seized control of Gaza. Israel shut the northern Erez crossing into Israel, isolating Gaza, limited imports to basic foodstuffs and medicine and cut fuel for the Gaza power plant, causing outages.

Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas proposed stationing US-trained guards at Rafah but Hamas insists on shared operation of the terminal. Hamas rejects the previous regime which placed the terminal under EU control.

Although Israeli defence minister Ehud Barak urged the immediate construction of a new border fence between Gaza and Egypt, it is unlikely that Cairo will agree or that Hamas would permit this to happen.

Neither can afford to co-operate with Israel's policy of blockading and besieging Gazans with the aim of ousting the de facto Hamas government there.

Hamas wants Egypt to provide electricity, food, medication and building materials to free Gaza from dependence on Israel.