Aid drivers hope for Gaza entry as Egyptian and Palestinian leaders meet at Rafah crossing

Approaching the Egyptian border with the Gaza Strip on the long, bumpy Mediterranean road, it is hard to ignore the increasing presence of camouflaged military personnel and equipment.

Young soldiers holding machine guns peek out from abandoned structures, the meshed windows of armoured vehicles suddenly appear between the divots of sand dunes.

Then you reach the wall.

Concrete sheets stretch metres into the sky and far off into the distance, with one road bisecting them, leading to the actual crossing.

It is lined with hundreds of trucks laden with aid bound for Gaza, but largely lying dormant as Israel continues to allow just a trickle of humanitarian access through the Rafah crossing.

A WHO worker standing in front of a lorry laden with ICU beds told Euronews that just 40 vehicles in total made it into the enclave each day, a number that sometimes falls as low as 15.

The UN and its agencies have said that they were able to bring in between 500 and 600 lorries each day during the ceasefire earlier this year to match the needs of Gaza's 2 million people.

“Yesterday I got in two of the four trucks I was hoping to get to Gaza. That was pretty good,” they said.

Israel maintains that Hamas is hijacking international aid and has set up its own controversial US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, which has since been accused of involvement in a series of incidents resulting in the deaths of hundreds of Palestinians as they came to collect aid.

But today, at the head of the road, just in front of a faux-pharaonic-styled border crossing, people were hurriedly setting up for pageantry, aware that Egyptian Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty and Palestinian Prime Minister Mohamed Mustafa would soon be arriving to make an announcement.

Under the punishing midday sun amid a major heatwave, a lectern was erected on a red carpet, lined with vases of plastic flowers, and a semi-circle of the world’s media prepared their cameras and added theirs to the burgeoning bouquet of microphones on the lectern.

A makeshift tent filled with ornate baroque chairs of black felt and flaking gold paint was filling up with journalists and dignitaries.

On the road, an excited army of young Egyptian humanitarian volunteers flanked the lorries.

A series of jolly, patriotic Egyptian songs beat out of a series of speakers. What sounded like a distant bomb thud turned out to be a sheepish man looking around, having just tested a microphone.

‘It’s only gotten worse’

Hidden from plain view and the intensity of the sun by the shadow of an aid truck sat Mahmoud and Ramadan, two Egyptian lorry drivers trying to get into Gaza to deliver the 25 tonnes of maize flour on the back of each of their trucks to the Strip's increasingly starving population.

As Mahmoud made coffee over a gas stove on the side of his lorry, Ramadan spoke to Euronews about why he was there.

“They are our brothers in Gaza,” he said, explaining it would be his first time entering the Strip. Ramadan had arrived over two weeks ago, and had been sleeping in his vehicle since.

The kanaka pot of sugary spiced coffee bubbled over, and Mahmoud rejoined the conversation. He’s been coming since the start of the war and has driven aid into the territory “countless times," he said.

A seasoned driver in his mid-50s, Mahmoud said that he used to be able to stop in Gaza when he was delivering aid at the start of the Israel-Hamas war in October 2023, reaching as far as the Strip's north.

“I would get out and speak to them, they’re all our brothers and sisters. We’d stop and I’d make coffee for them, I’d give the kids water,” he added, pointing to a small tap in the makeshift kitchen capsule on the side of the vehicle.

Things have changed dramatically since then. “At first, there were still some buildings, then they were destroyed. Then the people were all in tents, now even many of those are gone too,” he said, shaking his head.

“Now we can’t even get out of the vehicle. We just drop the aid and go. That’s if we can even get in.” Mahmoud said that he personally had to take tonnes of flour to be burned after it exceeded its six-month life span, sitting in warehouses or on unmoving trucks.

The unmistakable scream of a jet a few kilometres away was swiftly followed by a series of thuds. This time it was bombs. Yet the two drivers were unperturbed.

They just hoped that the high-level visit that day would result in getting them and their tonnes of food into Gaza. “God willing, it will be today," both exclaimed.

Words, but what action?

Minutes later, a large black convoy appeared like a mirage in the distance.

Lights flashed, the young volunteers stood rigidly in suspense. The red lights of cameras flicked on. The Egyptian flag fluttered above the border crossing.

As Egypt's foreign minister and the Palestinian Authority (PA) premier stepped up to the podium hand-in-hand, it was unclear what would be announced. Murmurs of machinations in the Egyptian capital over a new ceasefire deal increased the sense of anticipation.

Cairo has been accused by some of not doing enough to ensure the entry of aid or let Palestinians across into Egypt. The minister's words said otherwise.

“We emphasise here, in front of the Rafah crossing, that the Egyptian position towards the Palestinian cause is firm, it does not change,” Egypt's Abdelatty exclaimed.

“President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi has mentioned before that Egypt can never participate in any historical injustice to the Palestinian people,” he contended.

Next it was the turn of Mohamed Mustafa. “Brothers and sisters, our beloved people in the Gaza Strip, we will not rest until we restore the noble life to you," he said.

The PA has no control over Gaza, which remains under Hamas' rule. Yet Mustafa emphasised the Strip should be united with the West Bank to establish the Palestinian state once again, much to the nods in approval of those present.

"Long live Egypt, long live Palestine," Mustafa exclaimed.

In total, the two spoke for 25 minutes. No new announcement, no increase in aid distribution, no ceasefire for the time being, it seemed.

'We are actually counting on the EU'

At the press gaggle after, Euronews asked both politicians about getting more humanitarian assistance to civilians in Gaza and their thoughts on a Palestinian state.

"From our side, we are determined to end the occupation and start a new era for our people," Mustafa told Euronews. “We think that whatever the Israeli side says, it's their business."

Abdelatty – who has been instrumental in ceasefire and peace negotiations with Israel – was harsher, telling Euronews that “the Israelis used to say that there is no Palestinian partner for peace, now there is no Israeli partner.”

Maged Abu Ramadan, the PA's health minister and once mayor of Gaza City some two decades ago, stood right next to the two.

A striking, sombre figure well into his 70s, Abu Ramadan was more explicit about what he saw as the European role in ending the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza as the most pressing matter at this time.

“We are actually counting on the European Union to do a lot in order to make peace in the Middle East, to stop the killing, this atrocious killing,” the former surgeon, awarded by the UK with an Order of St John, explained to Euronews.

The EU remained a “great partner of the Palestinian Authority,” he said, adding that the actions of former colonial powers France and the UK mattered in particular.

“Because of the Balfour Declaration almost more than a century ago,” he says of the British mandate supporting the creation of a Jewish state in the land of Palestine in 1917, “they now have an obligation to make another declaration.”

“A Starmer Declaration, perhaps?” he asked in jest, quickly adding that he believed actions being taken by the Elysée Palace and Whitehall amounted to "paramount changes".

France has agreed to formally recognise Palestinian statehood at the UN General Assembly in New York next month. Britain has conditionally agreed to follow suit.

Both have been heavily criticised by Israel and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who said the recognition of Palestine would essentially boil down to "rewarding Hamas' monstrous terrorism".

Netanyahu has repeatedly opposed the two-state solution, saying that "Israel will continue to oppose unilateral recognition of a Palestinian state."

One convoy departs, another one remains

As the two more senior politicians were swamped by media from around the world, seamlessly switching between Arabic and English, Abu Ramadan stepped into the shade of the tent.

The top issue on his mind when it comes to the Palestinians — just 3 kilometres but dozens of military checkpoints away — was health. Abu Ramadan hoped he would take over the healthcare of the Strip, if and when a permanent ceasefire is announced and Hamas relinquishes power.

“Ninety per cent of our facilities are destroyed, equipment is destroyed, there’s no medication, nothing,” he lamented. Yet the minister saw some hope remain.

He estimated to Euronews that 60%-70% of health services could be resumed within six months, without explaining why. “I'm not talking about the buildings,” he quickly added.

“We Palestinians are excellent in finding solutions out of the box, and doing the work much faster than it usually takes other people,” he said.

However, the common theme of external aid returned. “We cannot do all that we are talking about without the support of our friends from all over the world, whether in Europe, or in the States.”

A flurry of action erupts behind him as the other two politicians get up and are whisked through a press pool to their convoy of black four-by-fours.

While all talk of statehood, peace and healing remained hypothetical, the convoy was heading to visit children who had left the Strip for emergency healthcare in Egypt, then were rumoured to be heading to the finest local restaurant.

Soon after they departed, Hamas announced that it would agree to a 60-day US-Egyptian-Qatari ceasefire proposal, leaving the final decision to Israel. The Qatari foreign minister flew to Cairo for further talks.

Back at the crossing, Mahmoud, Ramadan and thousands of other drivers still sat in place, hoping they could drive into one of the world’s most dangerous war zones and finally deliver some food.