ISRAELI tanks seized control of Gaza’s vital Rafah border crossing with Egypt today as Israel brushed off urgent warnings from close allies and moved into the southern city even as ceasefire negotiations with Hamas continued.
The Israeli attack came hours after Hamas said on Monday that it would accept an Egyptian-Qatari-mediated ceasefire proposal.
Israel insisted the deal did not meet its core demands, despite unnamed Egyptian and Western diplomat sources saying that the draft deal Hamas accepted had only minor changes in wording from a version the United States had earlier pushed for — with Israeli approval.
The changes were made in consultation with CIA chief William Burns, who embraced the draft before sending it to the Palestinian group, the sources said.
The Israeli forces’ overnight incursion has raised global alarm over the fate of some 1.3 million Palestinians crammed into the city — and threatened to widen a rift between Israel and its main backer, the US.
On Monday US President Joe Biden warned Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu again against launching an invasion of Rafah after Israel ordered 100,000 Palestinians to evacuate from eastern parts of the city.
The Israeli 401st Brigade entered the Gaza side of the Rafah crossing early today, the Israeli military said, taking “operational control” of the border point.
Both the Rafah crossing and the Kerem Shalom crossing between Israel and Gaza — the two main routes for entry points for aid to the beleaguered territory — have been closed for days.
The closures are a blow to efforts to maintain humanitarian supplies that have been trying to keep Gaza’s population alive at a time when officials say the northern part of the enclave is already experiencing full-blown famine.
Jens Laerke, a spokesman for OCHA, the United Nations’ humanitarian affairs office, said Israeli authorities have denied it access to the Rafah crossing. He warned the closure of the crossing will “plunge this crisis into unprecedented levels of need, including the very real possibility of a famine.”
The Israeli military “is ignoring all warnings about what this could mean for civilians and for the humanitarian operation across the Gaza Strip,” he said.
The Israeli military insisted it had seized the Rafah crossing after receiving intelligence that it was being used for “terrorist purposes” but did not offer immediate evidence to support the claim.
Egypt has previously warned that any seizure of Rafah or an attack that forces Palestinians to flee over the border into Egypt would threaten the 1979 peace treaty with Israel.
