RAFAH CROSSING INDEFINITELY CLOSED OVER UNREST IN EGYPT
Gaza City, 9 Shawwal 1434/16 August 2013 (MINA) – Egypt indefinitely closed on Thursday the Rafah crossing after a day of a deadly crackdown against pro-Morsi protesters, Palestinian official said.
Director General of the Gaza border crossings Maher Abu Sabha said the Egyptian side informed us the crossing will close in both directions due to the serious security conditions in Egypt.
Abu Sabha indicated that The Egyptian government gave no indication about re-opening the crossing, according to Alray, Palestinian Media Agency report monitored by Mi’raj News Agency (MINA).
Due to Israel’s land, sea and air blockade, the terminal is the only border crossing that most of Gaza’s 1.7 million people can use to leave the enclave.
The Egyptian authorities closed the crossing on last month following an assault on Egyptian security forces in the northern Sinai, killing at least one Egyptian soldier.
On 14 August, Egyptian security forces launched an early morning raid to clear the two main sit-ins of supporters of ousted president Mohamed Morsi. At least 2000people were killed, according to medical sources.
Scenes of chaos continued to engulf Cairo, where pro-Morsi protesters have camped out for weeks. There were reports of violence spreading to other cities around the country.
Hamas condemns ‘terrible massacre’ in Egypt
Hamas on Wednesday condemned Egypt’s bloody crackdown on supporters of ousted president Mohammed Morsi as a “terrible massacre.”
“Hamas condemns the terrible massacre in Nahda square and at Rabaa al-Adawiyya, and we call for an end to the bloodshed and to excesses against peaceful demonstrators,” its spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri told AFP.
Scores of people were killed as police moved in to disperse the two huge protest camps set up in Cairo by supporters of Morsi, whose Muslim Brotherhood movement is close to Hamas.
Egypt’s health ministry said in an updated toll that more than 2200 people were killed in clashes in the capital and across the country.
The deputy head of the Hamas government, Ziad al-Zaza, told Gaza’s Alray news agency that “the government expresses its great concern over the events taking place in Egypt.”
Gaza youth condemn massacre against Egypt demonstrators
Palestinian youth have condemned on Wednesday evening “the terrible massacres committed by Egyptian security forces against pro-Morsi demonstrators in the Rabia Al Adawiyya square in Cairo and the Al Nahda square in Giza.
The participants represented by university and college students gathered in Palestine Square in central Gaza city.
Passers-by and taxi drivers took part in the sit-in. The demonstrators raised Palestine and Egypt flags and slogans that demanded the reinstatement of Egypt’s legitimate President Morsi as a president democratically elected through the ballot box.
They appealed to youth groups and all the free world to “take a stand to delegitimize the military coup regime in Egypt to protect democracy principles and the civilized mechanisms of change that materializes through people’s expression of their will in the electoral process, not in a military coup,”
The organizers of the sit-in called to hold accountable all those involved in the massacres of Rabia Al Adawiyya and Al Nahda squares which claimed the lives of hundreds and wounded thousands of peaceful Egyptians.
They called on “the freemen of Egyptian army” to stand with the constitutional legitimacy and to protect the people’s will and free choice.
The activists preformed ‘Absentee Funeral’ prayer at the end of the sit-in in memory of the martyrs of Egyptians. (T/P02/E1)
Mi’raj News Agency (MINA)
