Egypt opens Gaza border ahead of Eid holiday (Roundup)

Sep 15, 2009, 12:12 GMT

Rafah, Egypt - Egypt opened its border crossing with the Gaza Strip on Tuesday for three days, Egyptian and Gazan security officials told the German Press Agency dpa.

Gaza's Hamas-controlled Interior Ministry said the decision will allow some 5,000 Palestinians, most of them medical patients and students at universities and schools abroad, to cross for 'humanitarian reasons.'

Israel also announced it would partially open three commercial crossings on its border with the Gaza Strip to allow humanitarian aid and fuel to reach the territory, where some 1.5 million people live in 360 square kilometres.

Egypt opened the border after coordinating with the Palestinian movement Hamas, which controls the Gaza Strip, for Eid al-Fitr, a three-day feast to start next Sunday, following the Muslim holy fasting month of Ramadan.

The move also follows a contentious meeting between Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Egyptian President Hosny Mubarak on Sunday.

In that meeting, Mubarak told the Israeli prime minister that Israel must stop all expansion of settlements in the West Bank, a move which Netanyahu has so far refused.

With brief exceptions, the Egyptian-Gazan border has been closed since Hamas security forces wrested control of the territory from Fatah security forces in 2007.

Egypt and Israel have made the full lifting of the blockade contingent upon a reconciliation deal between Hamas, which controls the Gaza Strip, and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas' faction, Fatah, which controls Palestinian-administered areas of the West Bank.

Such a deal would allow the implementation of a 2005 agreement that assigns control of the Palestinian side of the border to security forces from the Palestinian National Authority. Hamas rejects that agreement.

Israel has also tied opening the border to a prisoner-swap deal to free Gilad Shalit, the Israeli soldier Hamas captured near the Gaza border in 2006.

Exiled Hamas politburo leader Khaled Meshaal was in Cairo last week for talks with the Egyptians, who are acting as intermediaries, about the possible contours of such a deal, and Egyptian and Israeli analysts have speculated that the topic likely dominated the Monday talks between Mubarak and Netanyahu.