PA: Egypt humiliates visiting Palestinians

[JohnLocke]

PA: Egypt humiliates visiting Palestinians
By Khaled Abu Toameh - Jerusalem Post
January 2, 2003

The Egyptian authorities have imposed severe restrictions on the entry of Palestinians into Egypt, Palestinian travelers and Palestinian Authority officials said on Thursday. They complained that the Egyptians were deliberately seeking to humiliate them in response to the recent attack on Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Maher at al-Aksa mosque.
Last week, hundreds of Palestinians from the Gaza Strip were turned back at the Rafah border crossing. The Egyptian authorities did not offer any explanation for the new measures, but some Palestinians believe the move is linked to the attack on Maher.
Maher was forced to leave the Temple Mount without praying after scores of Palestinians attacked him and his aides with shoes and denounced him as a traitor because he had met with Prime Minister Ariel Sharon.
Sources in the Gaza Strip said that following the assault on Maher, the Egyptian authorities banned hundreds of Palestinians from entering Egypt through the Rafah crossing. The crossing is the only gateway to the outside world for Palestinians living in the Gaza Strip. Palestinians residing in the West Bank travel abroad via the Allenby Bridge.
A PA official said that Palestinians who arrived at Cairo Airport from different countries were also denied entry to Egypt. Earlier this week, a group of Palestinian students was forced to return to Jordan shortly after landing in Cairo.
The London-based Al-Quds al-Arabi daily reported that the wife of senior Hamas official, Mussa Abu Marzuk, was one of dozens of Palestinians held at Cairo Airport for 24 hours last week before she was told that she would be put on a plane back to Syria.
(...)
The Palestinian delegation requested a meeting with President Hosni Mubarak, but was turned down. Mubarak, according to a member of the delegation, was "deeply offended" by the attack on Maher.
"We were told that he's seething with anger," said the PA official. "But we had positive talks with Ahmed Maher and other senior Egyptian officials, and we agreed that we must not allow this unfortunate incident to harm the special relations between the Palestinian people and Egypt."
(...)
He accused Israel of exaggerating "this small incident" to undermine the Egyptian role as a peace mediator in the region.
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"He accused Israel of exaggerating "this small incident" to undermine the Egyptian role as a peace mediator in the region."
Surely another "Zionist conspiracy"!

[Name removed]

1. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[brainshrub]

2. I'd say it's been fun knowing you,

but it hasn't.

[Name removed]

4. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[JohnLocke]

3. Welcome to DU, lib13!

You'll like it here.
:toast: :toast:

[lib13]

5. thanks

thanks

[JohnLocke]

6. So what brings you to DU?

I'm a little worried about your first post. Why is it "good"?

[lib13]

7. why is it good

Gosh, my first day here and I have already gotten 3 warnings from the moderators. I will try to follow the rules, but this is my opinion:

Until the Palestinians renouce violence and adopt a strategy of nonviolence a la Martin Luther King or Gandhi, I cannot support them. Yasser Arafat and the PLO are terrorists and murderers.
I am NOT saying the Israelis are 100% in the right, they are not. That Egyptian MP was working for peace in the region, and those people who attacked him do not want peace. Flame me or ban me if you want.

[undergroundrailroad]

8. lib13, please check your "in" box.

You've got mail.

Thank you.


UGRR
DU Moderator
I/P Affairs

[Darranar]

9. But why punish them collectively?

[MikeGalos]

10. Bravo

and welcome. I think you'll find a lot of us here are pleased to see anyone working toward peace and condemning those who work for partisan violence. That it's only a lot of us and not all of us is tragic but at least it's improving.