War between Israel and Hamas: two days of Israeli airstrikes cause enormous destruction in the Gaza district
When the border in Gaza finally opened on Wednesday to allow people to flee to Egypt, many who crossed left behind more than constant bombing and power outages. In addition to seriously injured Palestinians being taken to Egyptian hospitals, only people with foreign or dual nationalities were allowed to cross, and many of them had to leave behind mothers, siblings or children.
Nadia Salah, 53, went to the border with her eldest daughter, Lama Eldin, on Wednesday, but then had to say goodbye and watch her get to safety. Ms Eldin was born 30 years ago in Bulgaria, where the family owned a café, and has Bulgarian citizenship. But Mrs Salah, her husband and their 20-year-old twins do not do that and so had to stay behind.
“It is very difficult, but she has to go,” Ms Salah said in a phone call from Khan Younis, choking back tears. “Being safe.”
Another Palestinian, Haitham Schurrab, 54, was traveling with his wife in Cairo when the full siege of Gaza began, but his three sons and daughter remained trapped in the Gaza Strip. They are all citizens of Austria, where Mr. Schurrab was born, and on Wednesday the sons were finally allowed to leave.
That only brought partial relief to the family. Mr. Schurrab’s 23-year-old daughter, Dayana, stayed behind because she had recently married and her husband does not have foreign citizenship.
On Wednesday afternoon, just as their three sons were on their way home, Mr. Schurrab said he had to take his wife to a doctor in Cairo because she was having a nervous breakdown.
“She is devastated,” Mr. Schurrab said. “She just keeps crying.”
Some people with foreign passports trying to leave Gaza on Wednesday arrived at the Rafah crossing to find that family members had not made it onto the official list of evacuees, forcing them to make an agonizing choice.
Abdallah Dahalaan, 76, lived in Australia from 1974 until about a year ago. A widower, he left his children and grandchildren in Sydney and returned to Gaza, where he was born and raised, to marry a Palestinian woman.
He had not yet obtained an Australian visa for his wife when war broke out, but the Australian government agreed to grant her an emergency visa so they could evacuate together.
But when Mr. Dahalaan and his wife reached the border on Wednesday morning, her name was not on the official list, compiled from names submitted by several embassies and agreed to by Israel, Egypt and Hamas. He protested and pleaded, but the border officials were unmoved. He said: Visa or no visa, she couldn’t go.
“She even told me to go when I got to the border. She said, “Go ahead and we’ll see what happens next.” I said, ‘No, I’m not going, I’m not leaving you behind,'” he said by phone Wednesday. “You can’t leave your wife, that’s not the right thing to do.”
He took back his Australian passport and the couple returned to their apartment in Khan Younis. All they could do now was wait.