How displaced Palestinians are adjusting to life in Egypt after escaping beleaguered Gaza

Displaced Palestinian women and gather on a sand dune above a makeshift camp on the Egyptian border, west of Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip on January 14, 2024. (AFP/File)
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Updated 31 March 2024
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How displaced Palestinians are adjusting to life in Egypt after escaping beleaguered Gaza

  • They describe financial troubles, post-traumatic stress, and survivor’s guilt since reaching safety of Cairo
  • They fear for friends and family still trapped inside the embattled enclave amid violence and looming famine

CAIRO: Palestinian civilians caught in the crossfire between Israeli troops and Hamas militants are finding ways to cross from Gaza into Egypt to escape the prolonged conflict. Once there, however, many grapple with financial hardship, survivor’s guilt and intense trauma.

Despite mounting international pressure, Israel has ignored repeated calls for a ceasefire and pleas to permit more aid by road to enter the enclave. The death toll has now exceeded 32,000, with children making up more than 40 percent of those killed, according to local health officials.

Among those who managed to escape in recent weeks the beleaguered territory long controlled by Hamas for the safety of Egypt is Anas, a 23-year-old Palestinian who now resides in a small two-bedroom house in Cairo with his relatives.




Displaced Palestinians talk to Egyptian soldiers at the border fence between Gaza and Egypt, on February 16, 2024 in Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas militant group. (AFP/File)

Speaking to Arab News at a coffee house in Dokki, a residential neighborhood on the west bank of the Nile, Anas, whose name has been changed to protect his identity, recalled his family’s displacement shortly after the war began on Oct. 7.

“We were displaced so many times,” he said. “At one point we were forced to take shelter at a school in the area called Awda.” It was there that Israeli troops began rounding up military-aged men and boys for questioning.

“Not only were they keen on killing us, they wanted to humiliate us as well,” said Anas.

“They were not following any rules. The investigations and their results were based on their whims. I saw men stripped down to their underwear with their eyes blindfolded. A lot of them I recognized as grocers, friends and neighbors. These were not militants, but that did not matter to the Israelis.

“They were taken into tents where the alleged investigation was happening and I could hear their screams resulting from what I can only deduce was torture.”




A Palestinian boy looks for cartons to make a fire in the Rafah refugee camp on March 21, 2024, amid ongoing battles between Israel and the militant group Hamas. (AFP)

Despite his fears about what might happen to him at the hands of his interrogators and amid the death and destruction around them, Anas said he felt duty bound to protect his 13-year-old brother, Mohammad, who had been injured in a bombing raid.

“All I could think of is how to get my brother proper care,” he said. “The house we were staying in at some point got bombed. I lost two friends and a cousin. My father got hit. He still carries the shrapnel. And my little brother’s leg got severely injured.

“I ran with him to the European Hospital in Gaza, but it was so chaotic there — hundreds of injured and a small medical team doing their best in a half-functional hospital.”

INNUMBERS

1.7 million Displaced in Gaza. (UN estimate)

70,000+ Housing units destroyed in Gaza (MoPWH)

32,300+ Reported killed. (MoH Gaza)

74,690+ Reported injured. (MoH Gaza)

The European Hospital in southern Khan Younis was initially intended to treat up to 240 people. However, since the conflict began, it has been overwhelmed by thousands of patients each day, its corridors and grounds packed with displaced Palestinians.

The health system in Gaza has all but collapsed. According to a statement in February from the UN Relief and Works Agency, UNRWA, just 12 hospitals remained partially functional, while some 123 ambulances had been destroyed.




This photo taken on February 29, 2024 shows displaced Palestinian children, including a 10-year-old with a pre-existing condition, at Al-Awda clinic in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip. The boy died on March 4, 2024 from severe malnourishment and insufficient healthcare with the lack of needed medication and severe malnutrition as living conditions in the besieged Palestinian territory deteriorate. (AFP)

“We knew we couldn’t treat Mohammad adequately and we knew our father’s condition may turn into an infection, so we made a collective decision to go to Egypt,” said Anas.

The family paid thousands of dollars to an agent to orchestrate their crossing into Egypt via Rafah. Mohammad, meanwhile, was taken to Qatar to receive medical treatment, sponsored by the Qatari government.

“I felt so relieved when I found out his leg did not need amputation,” said Anas. “That’s my baby brother. If I needed to, I would have chopped off my own leg if it meant healing him.”

Although he is now safe and able to sleep soundly in a bed without fear of bombardment and further displacement, Anas said he still has difficulty sleeping.




Some Palestinians fleeing Israeli bombardment in Gaza have managed to enter Egypt but at great risk and expense, according to some refugees. (AFP/File)

“I remember the sounds of the screams coming from the investigation tents. I remember the wailing of families at the hospital. I remember the chaos and I don’t think it will ever leave me,” he said.

“I feel guilty being here knowing so many of my friends are gone or still stuck in hell.”

Anas is not alone among those Palestinians who managed to escape Gaza in having to grapple with what psychologists refer to as survivor’s guilt — a common symptom of post-traumatic stress disorder.

“We knew on Oct. 7 that things were going to go bad, but we did not expect this level of cruelty and savagery,” Omar, a 40-year-old engineer, told Arab News at his new home in Cairo, where he and his surviving daughters are hosted by an Egyptian family.




Dual nationality holders are among the few fleeing violence in from Gaza to be allowed to enter Egypt through the Rafah border crossing. (AFP)

According to Omar, whose name has also been changed to protect his identity, many families in Gaza make the difficult decision to live in separate places to improve the chances of at least some of them surviving a bombardment.

However, Omar and his family chose to stick together. “If death was coming, it will be coming for us all,” he said. “It took the best of me instead.

“My parents, my brothers, their wives and their children, my sons, my daughters, my wife and I were staying together. A rocket fell and by the grace of God I was standing in the corner, which probably saved my life.”

As the dust began to settle, Omar called out to his family. “But it was mainly silence. Through the ringing in my ears it was deafening silence,” he said.

“I lost everyone except my daughters and my sisters. I gathered my sons’ limbs, piece by piece, meat by meat, to reassemble them again. I wanted to give them a proper burial, but I was deprived of that, too.”




Israeli troops stand guard near Egyptian trucks bringing in humanitarian aid supplies to the Gaza Strip, on the Israeli side of the Kerem Shalom border crossing with the Palestinian territory on February 6, 2024, as right-wing Israeli protesters gather to block the trucks from entering. (AFP)

Omar’s sisters begged him to find the means to move what remained of the family out of Gaza. Like Anas and his family, Omar was able to raise enough money to pay an agent to help them reach Egypt.

However, Omar says one of his sisters and her children were left behind after the agent left her name off the list presented to guards at the Rafah border crossing.

“I am physically here but my heart is in Gaza,” said Omar. “I cannot stop thinking about my sister and her children. I can’t eat or sleep properly. And I have no idea when she’ll be evacuated.”

He added: “Not only am I left with a huge debt, but also a survivor’s guilt I don’t think I’ll ever be able to shake off.”




Egyptian paramedics transport an injured Palestinian child to a Red Crescent ambulance upon his arrival from Gaza via the Rafah border crossing, on January 10, 2024 amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and the militant group Hamas. (AFP)

And although he is grateful to have been taken in by his Egyptian hosts, Omar says he feels like a “fish out of water” since leaving Gaza.

“While I am grateful to my Egyptian hosts, I feel stranded and confused,” he said. “My land is gone. I have nothing to return to. Entire neighborhoods have been leveled.

“I am haunted by my previous life, the sound of my wife’s laughter, my sons’ gleeful screams as they played. I feel soulless now. But I have to remain stoic for my daughters and my sisters. I am the only man left from the family. Their husbands have been arrested and we don’t know whether they are dead or alive.

“But after so much suffering, grace must come. God’s justice will not have it any other way.”
 

 


Iran president fires deputy over pricey Antarctica trip

Updated 5 sec ago
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Iran president fires deputy over pricey Antarctica trip

  • A photo shared on social media showed Dabiri posing near the Plancius cruise ship
  • The government faced strong criticism after the photo was published

TEHRAN: Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian on Saturday dismissed his deputy for parliamentary affairs over a costly trip to Antarctica, as the country grapples with hyperinflation amid a biting economic crisis.
A photo shared on social media in recent days showed the now former vice president, Shahram Dabiri, alongside a woman identified as his wife, posing near the Plancius cruise ship.
The Dutch-flagged vessel has offered luxury expeditions to Antarctica since 2009, with one agency pricing an eight-day trip at 3,885 euros per person.
“In a context where economic pressure on the population remains high... expensive leisure trips by officials, even if paid out of their own pocket, are neither defensible nor justifiable,” the Iranian president wrote in a letter published Saturday by the official IRNA news agency, which noted that Dabiri was dismissed.
Dabiri, a 64-year-old physician by profession and a close confidant of Pezeshkian, had been appointed to the post in August.
The government faced strong criticism after the photo was published, and several of Pezeshkian’s supporters urged him to remove the official.
IRNA late last month cited a source in Dabiri’s office as saying that he had made the trip before he held a governmental position.
The controversy is another major blow for Pezeshkian, who was elected last year on a promise to revive the economy and improve the daily lives of his fellow citizens.
In early March, his Economy Minister Abdolnasser Hemmati was dismissed by parliament amid a sharp depreciation of the national currency against the dollar and soaring inflation.


Israel is trying to destabilize Lebanon and Syria: Arab League chief

Updated 05 April 2025
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Israel is trying to destabilize Lebanon and Syria: Arab League chief

  • Targeted assassinations in Lebanon an unacceptable breach of the ceasefire agreement Israel signed late last year, Aboul Gheit said

CAIRO: Arab League Secretary-General Ahmed Aboul Gheit on Saturday accused Israel of trying to destabilize Syria and Lebanon through military provocations, in “flagrant disregard for international legal norms.”

In a statement, Aboul Gheit said that global inaction had further emboldened Israel.

“(T)he wars waged by Israel on the occupied Palestinian territories, Lebanon and Syria have entered a new phase of complete recklessness, deliberately violating signed agreements, invading countries and killing more civilians,” said the statement carried by the Saudi Press Agency.

He said that Israel’s resumption of targeted assassinations in Lebanon was an unacceptable and condemnable breach of the ceasefire agreement it signed with Lebanon late last year. 

Aboul Gheit said that Israel’s actions were driven by narrow domestic agendas at the expense of civilian lives and regional peace.

“It seems that the Israeli war machine does not want to stop as long as the occupation leaders insist on facing their internal crises by exporting them abroad, and this situation has become clear to everyone,” he said.

According to the Gaza Ministry of Health’s count last week, more than 50,000 people have been killed and more than 113,200 wounded in Israeli attacks on Palestinian territories in retaliation against the Oct. 7, 2023 Hamas attack on southern Israel.

In Lebanon, war monitors have said that at least 3,961 people were killed and 16,520 wounded in Israel’s war with the Iran-backed Hezbollah movement from Oct. 8, 2023 to Nov. 26, 2024.

Syria’s new government accused Israel on April 3 of mounting a deadly destabilization campaign after a wave of strikes on military targets, including an airport, and a ground incursion that killed 13 people in the southern province of Daraa. 


Syrian government says studying Amnesty report on massacres

Updated 05 April 2025
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Syrian government says studying Amnesty report on massacres

Damascus: Syria’s government said late Friday it was “closely following” the findings of a new Amnesty International report urging an investigation into sectarian massacres last month.
Amnesty called on the Syrian government in a report on Thursday to ensure accountability for the massacres targeting the Alawite minority, saying they may constitute war crimes.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitor has said security forces and allied groups killed more than 1,700 civilians, mostly Alawites, during the violence.
Interim President Ahmed Al-Sharaa, whose Islamist group Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham (HTS) led the offensive that toppled longtime ruler Bashar Assad in December, has vowed to prosecute those responsible.
In a statement on Friday, the government said it had been “following closely the Amnesty report” and its “preliminary findings.”
“It is up to the Independent National Commission for Investigation and Fact-Finding to evaluate them, in accordance with the mandate, independence, and broad powers granted to it by presidential decree,” it said.
The Syrian authorities have accused armed Assad supporters of sparking the violence by attacking the new security forces.
The government on Friday complained the report failed to note “the broader context of the events.”
It said the violence began with a “premeditated assault” by the “remnants of the previous regime, targeting army and internal security personnel.”
In the ensuing chaos, “acts of retaliation and serious violations occurred,” it said, vowing that these would be investigated and a report issued within a month.


Red Cross warns of continued threat of landmines in Iraq

Updated 05 April 2025
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Red Cross warns of continued threat of landmines in Iraq

  • Organization calls for greater effort to reduce contamination that spans 2,100 sq. km.
  • More than 80 casualties recorded since 2023

LONDON: The International Committee of the Red Cross said on Friday that landmines and explosive remnants of war continue to pose a severe threat in Iraq, contaminating an estimated 2,100 sq. km.

In a statement issued to coincide with the International Day for Mine Awareness, the organization said landmines from past conflicts, including the Iran-Iraq War and the 2014–17 battle against Daesh, remained a major hazard.

The contamination had resulted in civilian casualties, forced displacement, restricted farmland access and slowed reconstruction efforts, it said.

Between 2023 and 2024, the ICRC recorded 78 casualties from landmines and remnants of war in Iraq. Earlier this year, three students were killed in an explosion in Abu Al-Khasib, Basra.

The ICRC has appealed for greater efforts to reduce contamination and support mine-affected communities. Clearance operations continue in cooperation with national authorities and humanitarian partners.

The call for action comes at a time when several NATO member states, namely Poland, Finland and the Baltic states, have signaled their intention to withdraw from the Ottawa Convention, the international treaty banning antipersonnel landmines. They cited the growing military threat from Russia as the reason for reconsidering the ban.

Meanwhile, the US, previously the largest funder of global mine clearance efforts, has cut back support due to a foreign aid review under the Trump administration.

Washington had contributed over $300 million annually, covering 40 percent of total international mine action funding, according to the 2024 Landmine Monitor report, which led to major clearance efforts in Iraq, Afghanistan and Laos.

A State Department official said last month that the US had restarted some global humanitarian demining programs but provided no details.


Hamas says Israeli offensive in Gaza ‘highly dangerous’ for hostages

Updated 04 April 2025
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Hamas says Israeli offensive in Gaza ‘highly dangerous’ for hostages

  • “We have decided not to transfer these (hostages)... but (this situation) is highly dangerous to their lives,” said Abu Obeida

GAZA CITY: Hamas on Friday said Israel’s offensive in Gaza was creating a “highly dangerous” situation for the hostages held there, warning that half of the living captives were in areas where the army had ordered evacuations.
“Half of the living Israeli (hostages) are located in areas that the Israeli occupation army has requested to be evacuated in recent days,” Abu Obeida, spokesman for Hamas’s armed wing, said in a statement. “We have decided not to transfer these (hostages)... but (this situation) is highly dangerous to their lives.”