When Israel began conducting airstrikes in Gaza, everyone knew there was going to be displacement. The military operation comes after Hamas invaded Israel on October 7, murdering 1,200-1,400 civilians in a coordinated assault involving well over 1,000 terrorists. The level of barbarity was unprecedented, leading to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu forming a unity government that aims to destroy Hamas. On October 28, the ground invasion began, leading to scores of Palestinians attempting to make their way south to safety. Hamas shot some who tried to flee.
As the Left rages against Israel, hurling antisemitic slurs and chanting for more Jews to die, some might want to consider why the civilians have nowhere to go. Okay, maybe these folks do know but don’t care, but liberals are historically illiterate, so who knows? It goes beyond geography. The Palestinians bring trouble and have a long, sordid history of fomenting mayhem and terrorism in other Arab nations.
Egypt is the logical destination for these Palestinians, but Cairo doesn’t want them, and for good reason: terrorism. The border crossing at Rafah remains closed, with tanks now deployed to ensure their border is secure. Egypt’s prime minister even said his country is willing to sacrifice millions to ensure no Palestinians ever enter Egypt en masse (via WSJ):
If Hamas cared about Palestinian civilians, it would encourage them to leave Gaza. But instead it is demanding that they remain. The terror group intends to use its own people and the hostages it abducted from Israel as human shields. Their hope is that either Israeli concern about causing collateral damage or global opprobrium will force Israel to scale back its counter-invasion.
Egypt is the only place to which Gaza’s civilians can flee for now. Yet Cairo insists on maintaining its strict quota for entries from Gaza via the Rafah crossing—with only 800 able to leave on Monday, and the crossing reportedly closed in recent days.
Egyptian President Abdel Fattah Al Sisi bears no warm feelings toward Hamas, which is allied with the Muslim Brotherhood that tried to impose an Islamist regime in his country not too long ago. He’s concerned that Hamas terrorists might slip across the border into Egypt with a tide of civilians.
One way to reduce that possibility would be to house refugees in camps while they’re vetted for Hamas ties. The rest of the world should support a United Nations effort to help. But taking on this practical and financial burden is a risk Mr. Sisi may not want to take two months before Egypt holds what pass for elections there.
The timing is bad for Mr. Sisi, but unless he budges Egypt will become partly responsible for what could become a terrible humanitarian crisis—and that’s if Israel succeeds in rooting out Hamas. If Hamas’s strategy succeeds and Israel is forced by international pressure to scale back its defensive operations, Egypt will have to live with an entrenched and emboldened Hamas on the other side of the Rafah crossing.
If Hamas and the Palestinians aren’t freely moving into Egypt, they’ll be okay with it. Also, Israel has resisted ceasefires and has continued to chip away at the terror group’s infrastructure in Gaza, but a humanitarian crisis could still emerge.
As the tweet above mentioned, the Palestinians tried to take over Jordan in the 1970s, leading to the late King Hussein declaring war on them and driving them out. They were booted from Kuwait after collaborating with Saddam Hussein’s forces before the Gulf War. They set off a powder keg in Lebanon, a nation that has yet to recover from its brutal civil war that lasted 15 years. No Arab country wants these people because they bring instability and trouble. They’re not importing terrorism; that’s what we’re doing wholesale.
