Egypt Hates Them Too

TEL AVIV — Israel is not the only coun­try that har­rasses the Pales­tini­ans (whether rightly or wrongly); Egypt and Jor­dan do not like them either:

Pales­tin­ian wit­nesses say an angry crowd of peo­ple in the Gaza Strip has stormed a bor­der cross­ing with Egypt and is throw­ing rocks at Egypt­ian troops.

The wit­nesses say Egypt is repelling the crowd with water can­nons, and no one has made it across the border.

The Pales­tini­ans are upset that they are not being allowed to cross into Egypt. The Egyp­tians had promised to open the Rafah cross­ing on Tues­day, but only a small num­ber of Pales­tini­ans have been allowed through.

Egypt has kept the cross­ing sealed since Hamas mil­i­tants seized con­trol of Gaza more than a year ago.

The Pales­tin­ian Lib­er­a­tion Orga­ni­za­tion once tried to over­throw the Jor­dan­ian gov­ern­ment, so it was kicked out of Jor­dan. Yas­sir Arafat was prob­a­bly lucky to escape with his life. And now that Hamas con­trols the Gaza Strip, Egypt does not want a bunch of Islamic extrem­ists com­ing there, either.

I can’t say I blame them, but the open-air prison that is Gaza cre­ates an envi­ron­ment that only fos­ters anger and extrem­ism. Pales­tini­ans there can­not leave and enter either Israel or Egypt; they are trapped. But is it their own fault?