Egypt building ‘enclosure’ for displaced Gazans in Sinai: report

Cairo, Egypt – AFP

Egypt is building a walled camp in the Sinai Peninsula to receive Palestinians displaced from the besieged and bombarded Gaza Strip, says a US media report.

The Wall Street Journal article, citing Egyptian officials and security analysts, comes after a rights group reported Egypt was preparing “a high-security gated and isolated area” to receive Palestinian refugees.

The Journal said Egyptian authorities are constructing an “eight-square-mile walled enclosure” on the Egyptian side of the border with Gaza.

Since Israel launched its war on Gaza in early October, Cairo has warned against the “forced displacement” of Palestinians into the Sinai desert.

But with 1.5 million displaced Palestinians pushed up against its border and no results from cease-fire talks, Egypt is establishing the compound as part of “contingency plans” that could accommodate “more than 100,000 people”, the Journal said.

Fears of mass displacement have mounted with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s insistence that troops must push into Rafah, Gaza’s southernmost point, to achieve “complete victory”.

Palestinian leaders, the United Nations, Arab neighbours and Israeli allies including the United States have all warned about the impact on civilians of a Rafah offensive.

The Sinai Foundation for Human Rights, an Egyptian NGO, released a report this week that it said showed construction of the compound to receive Palestinian refugees “in the case of a mass exodus”.

AFP reviewed satellite pictures taken on Thursday of the area in northern Sinai, showing machinery building a wall along the Egypt-Gaza border. The area is highly secure and closed to journalists.

A comparison of satellite photos taken on February 10 and February 15 shows land having been graded.

– ‘Seven-metre walls’ –

North Sinai governor Mohamed Shousha has denied Egypt is preparing “an isolated area in Sinai” to receive refugees.

The construction work was to assess houses destroyed during upheaval in recent years to “properly compensate” owners, he said Thursday.

The Sinai Foundation for Human Rights said two contractors told it construction firms had been tasked with building the gated area, “surrounded by seven-metre-high walls”.

The site lies on the “rubble” of Egyptian homes “demolished” during the state’s war against Islamist insurgents in northern Sinai over the past decade, it said.

Sources in Sinai told AFP the area was being prepared in case of a breach of the Gaza border, which Egypt has fortified with additional walls and buffer areas since the war began.

“The area will be readied with tents” and humanitarian assistance would be delivered inside, said one source who spoke on condition of anonymity.

Egypt and Qatar are seeking a cease-fire before Israel proceeds with a full-scale ground incursion in Rafah, which it has already pounded with air strikes.

Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi has repeatedly spoken out against the forced displacement of Gazans and warned against jeopardising the peace treaty Cairo signed with Israel in 1979.

Others have warned against a “second Nakba”, when more than 760,000 Palestinians were displaced or driven from their lands in the creation of Israel in 1948 and never allowed to return.

Israel denies it is attempting to push Palestinians into Sinai, but ministers and officials have publicly supported the “voluntary resettlement” of Palestinians from Gaza.

Since early October, Israel has killed at least 28,775 people, mostly women and children, according to the Gaza health ministry.