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Evacuees have begun leaving Gaza via the Rafah border crossing into Egypt for the first time since the war between Hamas and Israel erupted more than three weeks ago, according to Egyptian state television.
Images of injured people leaving the Palestinian side of Rafah in ambulances were broadcast on Wednesday morning following negotiations involving Egypt, Israel and Hamas. It was not immediately clear how quickly the evacuees could pass through Egyptian controls into Egypt itself.
Diplomats were also hopeful that some of the 6,000 foreign nationals trapped inside the besieged coastal strip, which is sandwiched between Israel and Egypt, would be able to leave through Rafah.
Four people familiar with the situation said diplomats were discussing a plan to allow 500 foreign nationals to leave Gaza on Wednesday, and 1,000 a day thereafter, but cautioned that the situation could change.
Ashraf al-Qudra, the Gaza health ministry spokesperson, told Egyptian state-owned broadcaster al-Qahera News that an agreement had been reached for 81 wounded people to leave Gaza for treatment outside the strip but that “hundreds of thousands . . . need to go out”.
He added that the ministry was trying to send to Egypt patients who “are dangerous or complex cases for whom there is no treatment in Gaza and who can be transported”.
The head of the World Health Organization, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, said that it “welcomes Egypt’s decision to accept some injured and sick people from Gaza for treatment”.
The deal was brokered by Qatar, a western ally that hosts Hamas’s political office, according to a person briefed on the talks.
A person familiar with the situation said on Wednesday morning that the Egyptian authorities had not yet deployed enough staff to process all the evacuees arriving on the Egyptian side of the border and that as a result, it would take hours for them to enter Egypt.
A spokesperson for the Egyptian health ministry said 40 ambulances were being dedicated to the operation to move the injured across the border, and that they would be treated in the hospitals of al-Arish, Bir al-Abd and Sheikh Zowaied in North Sinai.
Civil society organisations in Egypt have been contacted to offer their services to adults accompanying injured children, the spokesperson added.
Foreign governments have been working with Egypt to ensure safe passage from Gaza for foreign nationals and Palestinians with dual citizenship through Rafah ever since Israel launched its bombardment of the Hamas-controlled strip more than three weeks ago in the wake of Hamas’s attack on Israel, which killed approximately 1,400 people, according to Israeli officials.
Israel’s bombardment has killed more than 8,500 people in Gaza and injured more than 21,500, according to Palestinian officials. Israel has also severely restricted supplies of electricity, water, fuel and food to Gaza, prompting UN officials to warn of a human catastrophe in the enclave.
On Wednesday morning, phone and internet services in Gaza were also cut off, with the telecoms company Paltel reporting a “complete disruption” of services in the enclave for the second time since the start of the war.
There is deepening international concern over the impact of Israel’s military strikes in Gaza. On Tuesday, Bolivia cut diplomatic relations with Israel, and Chile and Colombia recalled their ambassadors after an Israeli strike on the Jabalia refugee camp killed dozens of people. Israel said the strike had targeted a Hamas commander.
US secretary of state Antony Blinken said on Tuesday that finding a way to help the 500 to 600 US citizens trapped in Gaza to leave was a top priority that continued to be stifled by Hamas.
“This is something we’re working on every single day,” Blinken said while testifying at a US Senate hearing in support of President Joe Biden’s $105bn supplementary budget request for Israel and Ukraine. “To date the impediment has been Hamas.”
Itayi Viriri, a spokesperson for the International Organisation for Migration, told the Financial Times that several member states had reached out to the UN agency “requesting support in the evacuation of hundreds of foreign nationals from Gaza”.
Additional reporting by Nic Fildes in Sydney, Henry Foy in Brussels and Mehul Srivastava in Tel Aviv