JERUSALEM: Israel was expected to allow Gaza’s sole border crossing to the outside world to reopen Wednesday to allow humanitarian aid into the devastated territory as part of a US-backed ceasefire deal.
Israeli public broadcaster KAN said the reopening was imminent despite questions over Hamas’s ongoing transfer of the remains of deceased hostages, under a swap deal spearheaded by US President Donald Trump after two years of war.
The swap has seen the last 20 surviving hostages return home in exchange for nearly 2,000 Palestinian prisoners freed from Israeli jails, as well as a halt in the fighting and bombardment.
The Palestinian Authority said on Wednesday it is prepared to operate a key crossing for aid between Egypt and Gaza.
“Now we are ready to engage again, and we have notified all parties that we are ready to operate the Rafah crossing,” said Mohammad Shtayyeh, special envoy to President of the Palestinian Authority, Mahmoud Abbas.
So far, Hamas has handed back eight bodies, seven of which have been identified. The remains of 20 others remain in Gaza, and there is domestic pressure on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to tie aid to the fate of the bodies.
“It is with a broken heart and unbearable grief that we announce that the body of Tamir, my eldest and beloved son, was brought back from Gaza,” Tamir Nimrodi’s father Alon Nimrodi wrote on Facebook.
Tamir was a soldier captured at age 18 from a military base on the Gaza border.
Israel’s far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir has threatened to cut off aid supplies to Gaza if Hamas fails to return the remains of soldiers still held in the territory.
According to KAN, the decision to reopen Rafah also came after Israel was informed of Hamas’s intention to return four more bodies on Wednesday, a move not yet confirmed by the militant group.
Aid trucks
The war sparked by Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023 attack on Israel led to a humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza, with the densely-populated territory reliant on aid that was heavily restricted, when not cut off outright.
At the end of August, the United Nations declared a famine in Gaza, though Israel rejected the claim.
“Six hundred trucks of humanitarian aid will be dispatched (on Wednesday) to the Gaza Strip by the UN, approved international organizations, the private sector and donor countries,” KAN said on its website, without citing sources.
The return of aid is listed in Trump’s 20-point plan for Gaza.
Another is Hamas’s disarmament, a demand rejected by the militant group, which has been the dominant Palestinian faction in Gaza since 2007.
In Gaza, the group is tightening its grip on ruined cities, launching a crackdown and executing alleged collaborators.
Hamas has published a video on its official channel showing the street execution of eight blindfolded and kneeling suspects, branding them “collaborators and outlaws.”
The footage, apparently from Monday evening, emerged as armed clashes were underway between Hamas’s various security units and armed Palestinian clans, some alleged to have Israeli backing.
In the north of the territory, as Israeli forces withdrew from Gaza City, the Hamas government’s black-masked armed police resumed street patrols.
“Our message is clear: There will be no place for outlaws or those who threaten the security of citizens,” a Palestinian security source in Gaza said.
‘Perhaps violently’
Gaza civilians who spoke to AFP broadly welcomed the crackdown.
“After the war ended and the police spread out in the streets, we started to feel safe,” said 34-year-old Abu Fadi Al-Banna, in Deir Al-Balah, central Gaza.
Israel and the United States insist Hamas can have no role in a future Gaza government.
Trump’s plan says that Hamas members who agree to “decommission their weapons” will be given amnesty.
“If they don’t disarm, we will disarm them,” Trump told reporters at the White House a day after visiting the Middle East to celebrate the Gaza ceasefire.
“And it will happen quickly and perhaps violently.”
