The Gaza Freedom March in Cairo

The inhuman blockade of Gaza continues. After killing 1400 Palestinians and reducing Gaza’s much of Gaza’s infrastructure to rubble in a brutal and one-sided “war” – Operation Cast-Lead”, Israeli imposed a blockade, allowing only a small amount of essential supplies to trickle in. No rebuilding of Gaza is possible as no building materials are allowed. Against the daily requirement of 400 hundred trucks per day, only about 20 are allowed to enter. Senior officials of Israel chortle obscenely about putting Gazans going on a diet.

One year after the war on Gaza, 1400 activists gathered in Cairo in the name of Gaza Freedom March , with some token humanitarian aid in a bid to enter Gaza. This was in addition to Viva Palestina attempt to enter Gaza via Syria and Egypt with another aid convoy. Both these attempts came up against Egypt’s resistance. Finally, about 90 activists were allowed to enter Gaza in 2 buses from Cairo. Viva Palestina’s aid convoy was re-directed to el Arish, imposing a huge additional transportation cost . Turkey has offered to pay this cost – amounting to half a million dollars. We have yet to see whether all the 400 activists with Viva Palestina will be able to get into Gaza or only a small number will be allowed in.

As one of the1400 activists who gathered in Cairo, it was frustrating for me as well as others, the way the Egyptian government handled the issue. For them, keeping the bulk of activists out of Gaza and allowing only a token 100 to go was a part of a policy in which they have now become complicit in the Gaza blockade. We came up against Egyptian security apparatus in a variety of ways. The first was when activists planning to leave for the Rafa crossing found that the bus companies had been directed not to supply any buses. Some of us who managed to get buses to go to el Arish, a port town near Rafa, were stopped at the outskirts of Cairo and brought back. The press, which wanted to meet us, could not do so and we were cordoned off as we got down from the bus. A few activists who reached el Arish were confined to their hotels.

Continuous protests marked the days from 27th to 31st December. About 300 French activists camped for 3 days and nights in front of the French Embassy. On 31st, there was a march and a sit-in. Hedy Epstein, a 85-yewar old holocaust survivor sat on a hunger strike, with 28 others, stating, “My message is for the world governments to wake up and treat Israel like they treat any other country and not to be afraid to reprimand and criticize Israel for its violent policies vis-à-vis the Palestinians.” She said, “I brought a suitcase full of things, pencils, pens, crayons, writing paper to take to children in Gaza — I can’t take that back home.”

Any gathering of activists was completely surrounded by riot police in full gear. We left Cairo deeply frustrated with the way Egypt handled the Gaza blockade. It was as if Egypt was interested in becoming a public shield for the Israeli blockade. The net result was that instead of the anger against Israel, which we had come to demonstrate, a part of it was also channelled against Egypt.

Medea Benjamin, reporting on these events wrote, “We secured a meeting with Madame Mubarak, the president´s wife. Madame Mubarak arranged for 100 marchers to enter Gaza to deliver the humanitarian aid we had brought with us, under the umbrella of her organization The Red Crescent. This was considered a success until we began the difficult task of figuring out which 100 of the 1,400 would go.

To make matters more complicated, the Foreign Minister, who had not wanted ANY of us to be allowed in and was angry he had been overruled by Mrs. Mubarak, decided to fan the flames by saying in a press conference that the 100 seats were for the "good people"; and the rest of us were bad "hooligans" who were being left behind.” (http://www.codepink4peace.org)

All this resulted in a number of groups deciding not to go to Gaza, if this meant dividing the activists. Finally, about 90 activists, journalists and Palestinians who had not seen their families for years and some aid workers left for Gaza.

Despite all this, the one-year of blockade drew protests from across the globe. Over 1,000 Palestinian citizens of Israel and several dozen Jewish Israelis demonstrated outside of the Erez Crossing, demanding an end to the Israeli blockade of Gaza. Protests were held in Bethlehem, Bi’lin, and numerous other places.

The immediate issue is the further strangling of Gaza, which Egypt is now implementing. It proposes to block all the tunnels that connect Gaza to Egypt and is now building a steel wall below the ground for this purpose. While Egypt talks publicly of how these tunnels are illegal and violate its sovereignty, it neglects to mention why these tunnels are there in the first place.

The only way Gaza survives the blockade is because of these tunnels. Otherwise, neither the Erez nor the Rafa crossing provides any hope for the Gazans – left to legal supplies, all Gazans would be dying if not dead. The illegal tunnels are the only lifeline, as Israel continues to blockade Gaza from land, sea and air. Only Rafa is officially not under their control.

However, Egypt had agreed with Israel that it will only allow into Gaza through Rafa people and materials that Israel permits. The European Union (EU) observers were to monitor this agreement physically at the Rafa Crossing as a proxy for Israel. When the Fata-Hama break took place in 2007, the EU observers left Rafa as a part of their attempt to isolate the Hamas and consequently also Gaza. Egypt now uses this as a plea why it cannot open the Rafa crossing formally.

The politics of the Rafa crossing is not just of isolating Gaza. Israel hopes that with its blockade, the pressure on Egypt would mount over the Rafa crossing, forcing them at some point to opening this completely. At that point, Gaza would become Egypt’s problem. Instead of Israel being the occupying power, Egypt would effectively have taken over this role. They either become de facto responsible for Gaza or reject this role and impose their own blockade of Gaza. Either way, Egypt loses and Israel wins.

This policy is a continuation of the Israeli solution for Gaza: that it be merged with Egypt and separated from the West Bank. That way, they reduce by 1.5 million Palestinians the numbers in the occupied territory and transfer one of the most densely populated places in the world with virtually no resources to Egypt. It is this that Egypt is resisting, despite the obvious sympathy for the Palestinians in Egypt.

The problem is that while they are resisting this Israeli project, they are also not willing to speak up against Israel. In any case, the current regime has reduced itself to a basket case and survives only on the handouts given by the US. It is a client state of the US and without breaking with the US, in no position to confront Israel. That is why the only thing they can talk about regarding Gaza is how Hamas are breaking the “rules” by importing materials through “illegal” tunnels. Confronting the larger illegality of the Gaza blockade is beyond their capacity as a client state.

What is the course for all of us now who want to focus attention on the Gaza blockade? Do we build a much larger international coalition on this issue and try to break the blockade physically? A number of boats laden with supplies have tried to do just that, braving the Israeli navy boats. Do we focus on a campaign on the wall that Egypt is building? This is what the movements, which gathered in Cairo and elsewhere, will have to figure out. Gaza can and will not be forgotten – this is the message of the Gaza Freedom March.