The repercussions of Israel’s accusation against Egypt regarding the Rafah crossing continue to raise controversy, especially on the level of social media, where tweets and comments continued denouncing the occupation’s evasion of its responsibility, and demanding that the Egyptian regime open the crossing, as a direct response to Israel’s allegations.
The Rafah crossing is the only passage for Palestinians in the Gaza Strip to the outside world, as it is the only one that is not directly controlled by Israel out of 7 crossings surrounding the Strip.
Since the first days of the aggression, Israeli aircraft bombed the vicinity of the Rafah crossing 4 times on consecutive days, and the bombing occurred directly on the Palestinian side, and in the buffer zone with the Egyptian side.
Israel warned the Egyptian authorities to bomb any aid truck entering the Gaza Strip through the crossing, according to Israeli Channel 12.
However, the Egyptian side was surprised last Friday by the statement of Israel’s lawyer before the International Court of Justice in The Hague, Christopher Stacker, in which he said, “Access to the Gaza Strip through the Rafah crossing is controlled by Egypt, and Israel has no obligation to do so under international law.”
Egypt responded to the accusation through the head of the State Information Service, Diaa Rashwan, who confirmed in a television interview, “Egypt will take official action against Israel regarding the accusations it made against Cairo.”
The Israeli-Egyptian debate regarding obstructing the entry of aid to the residents of Gaza through the Rafah crossing sparked widespread interaction on social media, through tweets and comments, some of which were quoted in an episode (1/14/2024) of the “Shabakat” program.
Abdel Hamid wrote, “There is the Egyptian Rafah and the Palestinian Rafah. No one can approach the Egyptian Rafah and Israel knows that, but the Palestinian Rafah is part of occupied Gaza.”
Sami Hassan tweeted, saying, “Egypt is doing everything that is in the interest of Palestine… and Egypt is not waiting for anyone to look at it.”
Meanwhile, Abu Shehata called on Egypt to respond to Israel, saying, “If Egypt wants to deny the occupier’s story, it has only one choice, which is to open the crossing wide and allow all trucks to cross. In doing so, it will put the occupier before two options, the worst of which is bitter.”
Khaled Mahmoud also saw in his tweet that “the most logical and practical response is to open the crossing now without closing it at all, and to bring aid to the people of Gaza in full view of the world after officially notifying the International Court of Justice and international bodies of that, to monitor the actions and responses of the entity to that measure.”
It is noteworthy that the Genocide Convention stipulates that “any party that intentionally subjects a specific group to living conditions intended for their physical destruction has committed genocide,” and therefore this file was at the top of the items of the case before the International Court of Justice.
It is worth noting that South Africa filed a lawsuit before the International Court of Justice on December 29, accusing Israel of committing genocide against the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, which has been subjected to a devastating war for more than 3 months, leaving tens of thousands of martyrs and wounded, and a disaster. Unprecedented humanity.
