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Delayed Gaza relief convoy arrives in Egypt
EL-ARISH, Egypt - A relief convoy led by a British MP arrived in the Egyptian Mediterranean town of El-Arish on Monday after a dispute with Cairo on the route to be taken for its Gaza-bound aid.
- PUBLISHED: Wed 6 Jan 2010, 1:02 AM UPDATED: Mon 6 Apr 2015, 2:23 PM
- By:
- AFP
Around 160 activists arrived at El-Arish airport a day after a ferry brought their almost 200 relief-laden trucks to the town's port, some 45 kilometres (30 miles) from Egypt's Rafah border crossing with the Gaza Strip.
MP George Galloway struck a conciliatory note on arrival, telling reporters at the airport that he wished to “thank the (ruling) National Democratic Party for welcoming us.”
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But the convoy's arrival came after a bitter dispute between its organisers and the government, which banned the convoy from entering Egypt's Sinai from Jordan by ferry, forcing it to drive north to the Syrian port of Lattakia.
Cairo accused the convoy organisers of trying to embarrass Egypt, which has refused to permanently open its Rafah border crossing with Gaza after the Islamist Hamas movement took control of the Palestinian enclave two years ago.
The government said it had given advance warning to the organisers that they would not be allowed to cross from Aqaba in Jordan to Nuweiba port in South Sinai.
Last March, Galloway gave thousands of dollars and dozens of vehicles to the Hamas-run government in Gaza after arriving in an aid convoy.
Israel and Egypt have severely restricted travel to and from the Gaza Strip since Hamas seized power there in June 2007, after winning Palestinian legislative elections in 2006.
Hamas's takeover of the impoverished and densely populated territory led to an Israeli blockade that allows in only very basic supplies. Gaza was devastated in a war last winter between Hamas and Israel.