CAIRO (Reuters) — Tens of thousands of displaced Palestinians have crammed into the Rafah area on Gaza’s border with Egypt to escape Israeli bombardments, the United Nations said on Wednesday, despite their fears that they will also not be safe there.
The U.N. humanitarian office said in a report that most of the displaced people in Rafah were sleeping rough because of a lack of tents although the U.N. had managed to distribute a few hundred.
Civilians have been arriving following evacuation orders by the Israeli military that covered areas in and around the southern Gaza city of Khan Younis.
Hundreds of thousands of Palestinians had already fled from northern Gaza to the south during the two-month-old conflict between Israel and the Hamas it is trying to eliminate.
The latest exodus leaves many displaced Palestinians increasingly cornered near the Egyptian border, in an area deemed safe by Israel’s military.
Rafah crossing between Gaza and Egypt closed due to security: US State Dept
“The Israelis are lying. No place in Gaza is safe and tomorrow they are going to come after us in Rafah,” Samir Abu Ali, a 45-year-old father of five, told Reuters by telephone from Rafah.
“They want another Nakba but I will not leave. Rafah is the ‘end-of’ destination for me,” he said.
He was referring to the “Nakba”, or “catastrophe”, when many Palestinians fled or were forced from their homes during the 1948 war that accompanied Israel’s creation.
Other Gazans echoed his concerns.
“Israel is now pushing us towards Rafah and then they will invade there,” another displaced person who gave her name as Zinaib said by telephone from Khan Younis.
