Photos published by various media channels, including Al-Jazeera showed that Egyptian authorities are carrying out new repair work on the fence separating Egypt and the Gaza Strip east of Rafah.
The pictures were taken on Monday, according to Al-Jazeera. They showed heavy equipment transporting sand, strengthening watchtowers and concrete fences along the border with the Strip.
It is not clear why Egypt is carrying out the new fortifications.
‘Voluntary Migration’
Top Israeli government officials have repeatedly lobbied for ethnically cleansing Palestinians from the Gaza Strip.
Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, who has waged a genocidal war on the Gaza Strip since October 7, has been promoting the idea of ‘voluntary migration’, urging his Western partners to help in pushing Palestinians into the Egyptian Sinai desert.
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Egypt has repeatedly rejected the Israeli proposals, which, at least in the early days of the war, seemed to be supported by Washington.
Moreover, Israeli officials have accused the Egyptian side of turning a blind eye to alleged smuggling of weapons through the border area separating Egypt from the Gaza Strip.
‘Buffer Zone’
Spokesman for the Egyptian State Information Service, Diaa Rashwan, said that Egypt has taken steps to eliminate the border tunnels with Gaza permanently, as a 5-kilometer buffer zone was created between Egypt and the border with Gaza.
Rashwan also said that more than 1,500 tunnels were destroyed, and that Egypt strengthened its existing border wall with an additional concrete wall.
‘False Allegations’
Egypt has also denied accusations made by the Israeli defense team before the International Court of Justice (ICJ), where it said that Cairo is responsible for preventing the entry of humanitarian and relief aid into Gaza from the Egyptian side of the Rafah crossing.
Egypt described the Israeli accusations as empty “allegations and lies.”
Rashwan, said that the incoherence and falsehood of the Israeli allegations are clear from the fact that all Israeli officials, dozens of times confirmed in public statements since the start of the aggression on Gaza, that they will not allow the entry of aid to the Gaza Strip, especially fuel.
South Africa filed a lawsuit before the ICJ on December 29, accusing Israel of committing genocide against Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, which has been subjected to a devastating war for more than three months, leaving over 100,000 dead or wounded.
It also resulted in mass hunger and, per the words of the UN refugee agency for Palestine, UNRWA, a ‘looming famine.’
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Soon after the start of the war, Israel attacked the Rafah crossing, and went as far as ‘mistakenly’ shooting at Egyptian military targets.
This resulted in the shutting down of the Rafah border, at the expense of tens of thousands of wounded Palestinians who are unable to receive proper medical attention in Gaza’s destroyed or barren hospitals.
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Though Israel continues to accuse Egypt of being the main source of weapons to the Gaza Resistance, the New York Times reported on January 29 that a major source of Palestinian Resistance weapons is actually Israel.
“Hamas has been able to build many of its rockets and anti-tank weaponry out of the thousands of munitions that failed to detonate when Israel lobbed them into Gaza”.
“What is clear now is that the very weapons that Israeli forces have used to enforce a blockade of Gaza over the past 17 years are now being used against them,” the report said.
(PC, AJA)
