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Egypt Opens Rafah Border Crossing With Gaza Strip for 3 Days - Reports

© AFP 2023 / SAID KHATIBEgyptian soldiers, Rafah, Egypt (file photo)
Egyptian soldiers, Rafah, Egypt (file photo) - Sputnik International
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Over the past years, the Rafah border crossing has been opened only several times remaining mostly closed because of security concerns. Due to the Gaza Strip blockade by Israel, Rafah remains the only option for the region's residents who want to leave the Palestinian exclave.

MOSCOW (Sputnik) — The Egyptian authorities have decided to open the Rafah border crossing with the Gaza Strip for three days in order to solve the humanitarian issues of the strip's residents, the Al-Masry Al-Youm media outlet reported on Saturday citing its own source.

READ MORE: Hamas-Fatah Accord Risks Failing Due to Groups' 'Different Methods'

According to the source, the Egyptian authorities have provided those willing to cross the border with necessary vehicles.

Palestinians take part in a protest against the Gaza blockade, near Israeli Erez crossing in the northern Gaza Strip January 5, 2017 - Sputnik International
Hamas, Egyptian Officials Discuss Gaza Blockade, Palestinian Reconciliation
Egypt's opening of the Rafah border check comes as a friendly move in the wake of an agreement reached between Fatah and Hamas, which ends the division between the rival Palestinian organizations. Fatah and Hamas have been at loggerheads for a decade, with the former controlling much of the West Bank and the latter ruling the roost in the Gaza strip. Hamas is far more militant than Fatah and is associated with Islamist organizations like the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt while Fatah, which was led until his death by Yasser Arafat, has always been a secular group.

For the first time in a decade Gaza's crossing with Egypt was opened under the control of the Palestine Authority and not Hamas that previously siezed control of Gaza by force, provoking an Israeli-Egyptian blockade that seriously limited the movement of Gaza's 2 million inhabitants.

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