Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office announced on Monday that it has agreed to a “limited reopening” of the Rafah border crossing for Palestinian travellers, who undergo full Israeli inspection. Netanyahu conditioned the decision on the return of the remains of the last prisoner still inside Gaza — a condition that was met by the end of the day.
The reopening will allow “pedestrian passage only,” according to the statement, though no further details on how this will be implemented were provided.
Palestinians in Gaza have yet to be informed when the crossing will open or how they can register to exit.
Three sources informed of talks on the crossing’s opening and operation told Mada Masr that the United States is applying substantial pressure to the Israeli side to ensure the crossing is opened within the coming weeks.
If the crossing reopens, it will end the longest continuous closure in nearly 20 years of the only transit point between Gaza and Egypt, potentially easing access to healthcare outside the strip for some of the more than 10,000 patients in urgent need. The sources indicated, however, that when the reopening happens, it will likely be only partial, as Israel insists on retaining a controlling role over security at the crossing.
The Rafah crossing emerged as a renewed priority last week after United States President Donald Trump launched his Board of Peace.
Ali Shaath, head of the recently established US-backed technocratic National Committee for the Administration of Gaza — set to operate under the executive mandate of the Board of Peace — was the first to announce on the sidelines of Davos on Thursday that Rafah would reopen this week.
The crossing, closed since Israel invaded Gaza’s southernmost city in May 2024, was meant to reopen during the first phase of the ceasefire agreement initiated in October, but Israel refused the step. Alongside five other crossings between Gaza and Israel, it was intended to allow large deliveries of aid to meet residents’ desperate needs after two years of Israel’s genocidal assault on the strip.
But in the US’ efforts to propel forward the second phase of the ceasefire, which it announced unilaterally the week before Davos, it has applied pressure on Israel for its cooperation to open the border.
“What we know is that the United States says that regardless of whether the [final] body is retrieved, the Rafah crossing will open by the end of the week,” a senior official in the Fatah movement in Gaza told Mada Masr on condition of anonymity.
An informed Egyptian official also confirmed the US’ pressure on Israel for an agreement on Rafah’s operation and anticipated the crossing could open as soon as Thursday.
Netenyahu met US officials Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner on Saturday, with media outlets reporting that they discussed the Rafah crossing.
But key operational details remain unresolved. Another senior Fatah official suggested the timeline might extend up to two weeks, noting the US promised Shaath the crossing would open within that period.
Israel initially demanded full, sole security control, according to the Egyptian official, who spoke to Mada Masr on condition of anonymity. Egypt, however, insists that Palestinian officials must play a role in the crossing’s operation.
“Egypt demands an Egyptian presence on the Egyptian side and a Palestinian presence on the Palestinian side,” the Gaza-based Fatah source explained, adding that the Palestinian side could be under European supervision, as was the case in the 2005 arrangement following Israel’s disengagement from Gaza.
Both sources agreed the most likely scenario involves the EU acting as an intermediary between Egypt and Israel at the crossing, at least temporarily, effectively deferring the Palestinian role.
The Egyptian official added that other restrictions will apply: the crossing will open only for limited hours daily, access will be restricted, and movement will be subject to Israeli screening.
The Fatah sources also anticipated that Israel will seek to limit the number of Palestinians allowed to return to Gaza compared to those permitted to exit.
Of nearly 150,000 Palestinians who fled to Egypt during the war, the first Fatah source said, many remain hesitant to return given Gaza’s dire conditions. About 30,000 people have registered to return, they added, but Israel is seeking to impose conditions to reduce that number.
Israel insists on allowing more people to leave Gaza than enter, aiming to exert maximum pressure on the strip’s residents to push them toward displacement. “Israel will try to ensure that as many as possible leave, and will block most from re-entering,” the second source said.
Hundreds of Palestinians remain stranded in Arish, unable to return to Gaza due to Israel’s ongoing hostilities. Some of them previously told Mada Masr, early in the war, that they wish to go back.
According to official estimates, nearly 100,000 Palestinians evacuated to Egypt amid Israel’s genocidal onslaught on the strip.
While Israeli officials have floated the idea of opening the border for exit only, Egypt insists on bidirectional access.
Egyptian authorities have repeatedly rejected US and Israeli proposals since October 2023 to forcibly displace Palestinians from Gaza.
Despite repeated assertions by Trump over the past year that Palestinians would be resettled in Egypt and Jordan to create his envisioned “Riviera of the Middle East,” officials in Egypt and Jordan have categorically rejected the proposal — the most recent of Sisi’s rejections coming in a speech to the Egyptian public on Saturday.
Saudi Arabia has also publicly rejected these plans as well, especially after Neteyahu suggested establishing a Palestinian homeland in Saudi territory.
Egypt’s stance on Rafah is clear, the senior Fatah official in Gaza told Mada Masr on condition of anonymity. It insists that “the crossing should be opened in both directions, not just one way as Israel wants,” they said.
The agreement reached so far, according to the Egyptian source, is a phased introduction of Palestinian presence at the border, with the European Union acting as an intermediary between Egypt and Israel in the interim.
The same source called the EU presence on the Palestinian side a “good transitional arrangement,” emphasizing that the key priority is ensuring the crossing operates in both directions.
Before Israeli forces occupied the Palestinian side of the border area in May 2024, Rafah was Gaza’s main entry point for humanitarian aid and evacuations, for Palestinians and foreign nationals.
Since 2007, after the collapse of Palestine’s national unity government, Israel and Egypt have controlled the entry and exit of goods and individuals, with Palestinian officials cooperating with Egyptian authorities to manage the Rafah crossing.
By 2014, exit processes were formalized under a “coordination business” that requires individuals to pay fees for applications processing and Israeli security checks.
As Israel began its genocidal onslaught on the strip in 2023, coordination fees soared.
At the time, Hala — the company founded by Sinai businessman Ibrahim al-Argany in 2019 — came to dominate the coordination process through its owner’s security and logistics network.
Argany’s other company, Sons of Sinai, also controlled humanitarian aid and commercial goods entering through Rafah, charging high fees in a practice that became known as “goods coordination.”
Since May 2024, despite the ceasefire, the border remains a closed military zone under Israeli occupation.
“We don’t have any information, official or otherwise, about the future of the crossing or whether it will open,” Abdel Aziz Abu Aeshe, crisis operations manager for the Red Crescent in Gaza, told Mada Masr on Monday.
“But no one can approach the crossing at present, it is very dangerous.”
Noting that lists compiled for urgent medical travel currently comprise as many as 17,000 names, Abu Aeshe said that the priority from his standpoint is finding a way for the sick to leave the strip and seek care abroad, since the strip’s medical system has collapsed.
“Any mechanism [for operating the crossing] under occupation will have challenges,” he said, “but for us, right now, any arrangement allowing the huge number of people in urgent need to exit for medical care will be valuable.”
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