Egypt Begins Limited Reopening of Gaza Border Crossing

<snip>

"Palestinian officials say Egypt has temporarily opened the border at the Gaza Strip for humanitarian reasons.

The crossing at Rafah opened Saturday to allow hundreds of Palestinians in the Hamas-controlled region to enter Egypt for medical treatment.

Hamas officials say the border will be open for three days to allow Palestinians who have been stranded on either side of the border for several months to return home.

Egypt has been trying to broker a truce between Hamas and Israel, which has sealed off Gaza at the border since the militant Islamist movement seized control of the territory last year.

The blockade has caused widespread shortages of basic goods. Hamas militants blew open a large section of the barricade in January, allowing hundreds of thousands of Palestinians to cross into Egypt for supplies."

http://www.voanews.com/english/2008-05-10-voa11.cfm

and considering how much I have read here about how Egypt should be more supportive of the Palestinians I am "surprised that more of the proIsrael crowd is not cheering this on.

Good for Egypt.

Maybe they will take on providing fuel and food too, so that the Israelis no longer have to risk their lives to deliver aid to people who have sworn to obliterate their nation.

Egypt can control the access, can deliver food and supplies without getting its citizens killed....

what i dont get is why there was no pressure from all those "human rights groups" who supposedly put human rights above politics?

actually i do get it, i learned here, that, its not civil rights etc that was the main concern, but "getting back at israel" that was far more important. (i believe one of the remarks was: israels responsible for the situation and they have to fix it....). Like israel pulling out of gaza and the rocket fire exposing the real intent of hamas etc, the blockade by egypt exposed the real agenda of the "human rights" groups.....and it wasnt/isnt human rights.

via 5 iines....no more than pure humanitarian reasons.... especially since the kassams land on the electrical plant that supplies them.....

i'm sure there is some evil intent somewhere, on the part of the israelis, but i cant figure it out

For free out of the goodness of its heart? There is no payment, say though taxes collected the PA? Also these "humanitarian reasons have nothing to do with annex 3 to the Oslo Accords?

the PA doesnt have much money.... payments as far as i know are not consistent.....

.... continual attacks by the ruling govt of gaza (hamas-who declared oslo cancelled) has long cancelled out any oslo commitment anyways....

(your using old news...collected taxes have been sent to the PA-try something else, i'm sure you'll find something...)

never have..

so i'm just waiting on the "edge of my seat here"....why is israel supplying electricity to gaza?

You claim that Oslo has been canceled, did the Israeli government officially state that? I found an article were a Hamas official says it should be canceled but nothing more official than that.

http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2008/882/fo92.htm

so with Egypt/gaza having their own border (their goes that part of the agreement).....hamas daily shooting missiles into israel (another part declared null and void)....and hamas rules gaza...and not the PLO, oslo is not longer applicable.

Israel has decided to recognize the PLO as the representative of the Palestinian people

and if you look up "oslo null and void" you find quite a few references including the then PM sharon....

_____

Iisrael has cut off fuel at times, closed the borders for trade etc...all against oslo in deed if not in the spirit. Pretending israel gives them electricity because of oslo is like pretending israel controls the gaza/egypt border (remember those discussions?)

the ones where I kept telling you that political pressure is not the same as control, but you kept insisting it was?

I did look up Oslo null and void, I found a lot of opinion, do need the quote about everybody having one? But nothing official, if it is as you say no more then why all he talk about "the roadmap" which is based on Oslo?

The official quoted in this article isn't from Hamas. Ramadan Shallah is from Islamic Jihad, and lives in Syria. Apparently he hasn't even been to Gaza for many years, having worked as a University Prof. in Florida until the mid 90's when he decided to do the Jihad thing for awhile. At any rate, IJ never recognized Oslo. Both they and Hamas have been calling for its cancellation since day one and have always refused to recognize it. Hamas began launching suicide attacks in protest of Oslo a day or two after it was first signed in 1993. You can't get much more official than that.

Now what in the world makes you think Israel is doing anything because of Oslo at this point? What is Hamas going to do? Sue them? Complain that they aren't upholding the treaty that Hamas doesn't recognize themselves? Really, do you think Israel is so blind that they still consider themselves bound by an agreement that the Palestinians fully rejected years ago when the intifada began? Since the Palestinians aren't fulfilling any of their obligations under Oslo, Israel isn't under any obligation to uphold its own side.

But I was just thinking about something... what do you think about this? Hamas won the general election and have most of the seats in the PA now, right? (Officially anyway, I know the coup thing made all of this very ambiguous.) At any rate, Hamas governs Gaza with the assertion that they are the Palestinian's legally elected representatives. Yet they simultaneously reject the Oslo Accords, which is the very agreement that granted the Palestinians their electoral privileges in the first place. Now it isn't like Israel can stop them from holding their own elections or anything. But if Hamas has rejected the very treaty that they draw their authority from then I don't see why Israel (or anyone else) should be under any obligation to regard them as elected officials or members of the PA.

Hopefully we'll hear more stories like this.

I'm interested in hearing from those who still insist that Gaza is occupied by Israel, who control all of the borders or something like that. Do you believe that Israel is behind this decision?