Report by the Anti-imperialist Camp’s delegation Rafah, May 24, late night
For 10 days we have been waiting in Egypt to get into Gaza with the caravan “Hope” initiated by the “European Campaign to end the siege on Gaza”. The caravan is composed of 120 people from a dozen European countries and about 40 vehicles (ambulances and trucks packed with medical goods).
It has been planned to take over the vehicles coming from Genoa by ship in Alexandria. But the Egyptian authorities imposed a change of programme claiming “security reasons”. We had to go to Port Said were we were forced to wait for the ship which in the meantime had to go the long way round.
These – foreseeable – difficulties did not break our determination but helped to highlight once again the gravity of the situation in Gaza. Humanitarian help is still systematically blocked from entering Gaza. And the so-called “international community” keeps silent!
Eventually on May 23 the convoy was allowed to move ahead accompanied by Egyptian army and police. Once again we had to stop, this time in Al Arish.
On May 24 the decisive moment seemed to have arrived. All of us have the necessary visa to enter Gaza but the Egyptian border control continued to raise problems. So we could not enter and were forced to sleep at the border station.
Tomorrow morning we will see.
Maria Grazia Da Costa
Italian participant to the Caravan Hope
Member of the Anti-imperialist Camp