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Twenty-five more Palestinians have returned to Gaza through the Rafah crossing following its long-awaited partial reopening, describing an exhausting journey through humiliating Israeli security measures, while patients in need of urgent medical treatment abroad are being transferred to the border.
This comes as the Wafa news agency reported a Palestinian man was killed by Israeli forces in Bani Suheila, east of Khan Younis, on Thursday, as Israeli attacks continue despite a “ceasefire” in the Gaza Strip.
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The group of 25 – the third batch to return since the heavily restricted reopening of the crossing into Egypt – entered the Strip at 3am local time (01:00 GMT), with buses delivering them to Nasser Hospital in the southern city of Khan Younis more than 20 hours after they left the Egyptian city of El Arish.
Hours later, 13 Palestinian patients, accompanied by family members and World Health Organization (WHO) officials, were transferred from a hospital towards the crossing for medical treatment abroad.
Some of the returnees, visibly fatigued from their ordeal, told an Al Jazeera team in Gaza that they had been interrogated and insulted by Israeli forces as they passed through security controls.
Footage showed emotional scenes as returning Palestinians embraced loved ones from whom they had long been separated, and registered firsthand the scenes of devastation caused by the war in their homeland.
“The feeling is like being caught between happiness and sadness,” one returnee, Aicha Balaoui, told the Reuters news agency.
“I’m happy to be back and to see my family, my husband and my loved ones, thank God. But I also feel sad for my country after seeing the destruction. I never imagined the devastation would be this severe.”
She said while she had lived in comfort and safety abroad, “I wasn’t at peace because it wasn’t my place.
“My place is here. My place is Gaza,” she said.
The Rafah crossing with Egypt, the sole route in or out of Gaza for nearly all of the territory’s more than two million inhabitants, was closed by Israeli authorities for most of the war, but was partially reopened on Monday.
The reopening of the crossing – to allow the return of Palestinians who have left, and the evacuation of patients requiring medical treatment outside the Strip – is one of the terms of the US-brokered “ceasefire” agreement to end the war in Gaza.
Only Palestinians who left Gaza during the war are being permitted to return, and people travelling in both directions are being subjected to strict security vetting – a process which returnees have described as humiliating and abusive.
Palestinian women who returned earlier this week described to Al Jazeera having their hands bound and eyes covered, being interrogated and subjected to full body searches as part of the security screening.
The International Commission to Support Palestinian People’s Rights (ICSPR) has said the strict Israeli measures have turned the Rafah crossing “into a tool of control and domination rather than a humanitarian passage”.
Only 13 patients awaiting transfer
Reporting from Khan Younis, Al Jazeera’s Hani Mahmoud said 13 Palestinian patients had been taken by bus from a hospital in the Gazan city, due to cross to the Egyptian side of the Rafah crossing in order to receive medical treatment abroad.
Families of the patients had begun receiving phone calls late on Wednesday telling them to prepare for their transfer, he said. Israel had briefly suspended coordination over the medical transfers before resuming it hours later.
But the pace of the medical evacuations since the crossing’s partial reopening was slower than the numbers promised, and far short of what was required to meet the needs of the approximately 20,000 patients in need of medical treatment in other countries.
While the agreement had spoken of 50 patients being evacuated each day, each accompanied by two family members, only about 30 had been transferred so far this week.
“If we keep this pace each passing day, we’re looking at at least three years” to complete the required medical evacuations, Mahmoud said.
“This is a very long time for those in need of immediate medical care.”
Gaza’s healthcare system has been devastated by Israel’s genocidal war on the enclave, with 22 hospitals put out of service and 1,700 medical workers killed, according to the Palestinian Ministry of Health.
[Al Jazeera] (Al Jazeera)Israeli attacks continue
Meanwhile, as the returns played out in southern Gaza, Israel continued to carry out attacks across the Strip, a day after 23 Palestinians were killed in one of the deadliest days since the October “ceasefire” began.
Israel carried out air strikes east of Deir el-Balah in central Gaza, and east of Khan Younis in the south, Al Jazeera teams reported.
Reporting from Khan Younis, Al Jazeera’s Mahmoud said there had also been Israeli air strikes, gunfire and heavy artillery shelling targeting Gaza City’s eastern Tuffah neighbourhood, which was next to the so-called “yellow line” demarcating territory under Israeli military control.
He said the repeated attacks had left residents of the neighbourhood “trapped” – giving them the option of remaining near the area controlled by the Israeli military or being displaced from their homes.
