Washington said on Monday that it was deeply concerned that thousands of Palestinians are stranded because Israel has closed a border crossing between Egypt and Gaza, in an apparent and rare rebuke of the Jewish state.
Washington avoided blaming any side and urged Egypt, the Palestinian Authority and Israel to find a way to allow Gazans to return home.
But it also emphasized the Palestinians' suffering and worried that the closure could hurt peacemaking.
Israel closed the Rafah border crossing, which it controls, on July 18, citing security reasons and saying it had information about a possible attack on or near the crossing.
The unusually long closure has drawn anger from Palestinians and criticism from rights groups, which say standards of hygiene are poor at the crowded crossing.
One woman gave birth to a baby girl while waiting.
"We are deeply concerned about it. It is a humanitarian problem that disturbs us," State Department spokesman Adam Ereli said.
"The burden and hardship being imposed upon Palestinians is problematic," he said.
"We are reiterating our call on all the parties to avoid taking steps or actions that undermine trust and create new obstacles to implementing the [peace] roadmap," he added.
Many Arabs accuse the US of favoring the Jewish state in brokering peace.
But the Bush administration, which rarely criticizes Israel, has sought to blunt such accusations by providing humanitarian aid for occupied areas and expressing its sensitivity to Palestinians' suffering.
Gaza's air and sea routes have been cut during a Palestinian uprising that began in 2000.
The crossing with Egypt is the only entrance and exit point for most Gazans into the sliver of land on the Mediterranean coast.
Israel regularly closes Rafah because of security alerts or army operations in the area, a stronghold of Islamic militants. But such closures rarely last more than a few days.
Israel has accused the Palestinian Authority of worsening the problem by rejecting an offer to let travelers use a crossing into Israel and then be brought home to Gaza.
Palestinians said they could not accept the Israeli proposal because it would let only 200 people a day reach Gaza.
DITCH TACTICS: Kenyan officers were on their way to rescue Haitian police stuck in a ditch suspected to have been deliberately dug by Haitian gang members A Kenyan policeman deployed in Haiti has gone missing after violent gangs attacked a group of officers on a rescue mission, a UN-backed multinational security mission said in a statement yesterday. The Kenyan officers on Tuesday were on their way to rescue Haitian police stuck in a ditch “suspected to have been deliberately dug by gangs,” the statement said, adding that “specialized teams have been deployed” to search for the missing officer. Local media outlets in Haiti reported that the officer had been killed and videos of a lifeless man clothed in Kenyan uniform were shared on social media. Gang violence has left
US Vice President J.D. Vance on Friday accused Denmark of not having done enough to protect Greenland, when he visited the strategically placed and resource-rich Danish territory coveted by US President Donald Trump. Vance made his comment during a trip to the Pituffik Space Base in northwestern Greenland, a visit viewed by Copenhagen and Nuuk as a provocation. “Our message to Denmark is very simple: You have not done a good job by the people of Greenland,” Vance told a news conference. “You have under-invested in the people of Greenland, and you have under-invested in the security architecture of this
Japan unveiled a plan on Thursday to evacuate around 120,000 residents and tourists from its southern islets near Taiwan within six days in the event of an “emergency”. The plan was put together as “the security situation surrounding our nation grows severe” and with an “emergency” in mind, the government’s crisis management office said. Exactly what that emergency might be was left unspecified in the plan but it envisages the evacuation of around 120,000 people in five Japanese islets close to Taiwan. China claims Taiwan as part of its territory and has stepped up military pressure in recent years, including
UNREST: The authorities in Turkey arrested 13 Turkish journalists in five days, deported a BBC correspondent and on Thursday arrested a reporter from Sweden Waving flags and chanting slogans, many hundreds of thousands of anti-government demonstrators on Saturday rallied in Istanbul, Turkey, in defence of democracy after the arrest of Istanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu which sparked Turkey’s worst street unrest in more than a decade. Under a cloudless blue sky, vast crowds gathered in Maltepe on the Asian side of Turkey’s biggest city on the eve of the Eid al-Fitr celebration which started yesterday, marking the end of Ramadan. Ozgur Ozel, chairman of the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP), which organized the rally, said there were 2.2 million people in the crowd, but
RSS