Palestinians pour into Egypt

JERUSALEM (MCT) — Seizing a moment of opportunity, tens of thousands of Palestinians trapped for months in the Gaza Strip by a blockade and border closures poured into Egypt on Wednesday to replenish supplies and see relatives after militants blew open the border wall at the southern town of Rafah.

The surge across the frontier, which overwhelmed police, came nearly a week after Israel tightened a blockade of Hamas-controlled Gaza in response to intense rocket fire by Palestinian militants, worsening shortages of fuel, electricity and other goods.

The border breach put Egypt and Israel, who have kept Gaza's borders shut since Hamas seized control of the territory last June, in a quandary.

Israel said it expected Egypt "to solve the problem," and officials said they were concerned that there could be an easier flow of arms and militants into Gaza. The Egyptian government is under public pressure to help the besieged Palestinians but fears a spillover of militant activity across its border.

The events also threatened to aggravate tensions between Egypt and Israel, whose relations were strained in recent weeks following Israeli accusations that Egypt was not doing enough to secure the border and stop arms smuggling from its territory into the Gaza Strip.

Early Wednesday, a series of explosions set off by militants breached the 30-foot-high iron border wall built by the Israelis when they occupied Gaza. Thousands of people streamed over the toppled structure and through another blasted wall into the Egyptian side of Rafah, where border guards, greatly outnumbered, made no attempt to stop them.

"We have been dying a slow death because of the Israeli siege, and people had no choice but to break out and get what they need in Egypt," said Salman Abdullah, 25, a truck driver from Rafah.

People crowded around gas stations, filling plastic containers with fuel. Others stocked up on cement, detergent, cooking oil and cigarettes, and some carried sheep and goats back across the border. The items in demand are either scarce in Gaza or far cheaper in Egypt.