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Israel Allows Some Palestinians to Leave Gaza
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The Israeli military said nine Palestinians passed through this crossing Wednesday to seek medical care in Israel. Among them was a 17-year-old youth with leukemia who had been entering Israel regularly for treatment before Hamas took control. Others sustained injuries during recent fighting.
Shlomo Dror, spokesman for Israel's Coordinator of Activities in the Territories, said a Fatah official from the Health Ministry in Gaza used to serve as the liaison with Israeli authorities for such visits.
"Now," Dror said, "we don't know if he is alive or dead."
In punishing heat, Palestinian Health Ministry ambulances pulled up to the 24-foot-high wall and gun tower at the entrance to the crossing.
Red Cross attendants then wheeled patients 50 yards beyond the military checkpoint to where Israeli ambulances waited. During one transfer, medical workers held a blanket above a gurney bearing what appeared to be a young boy, shading the patient from the sun during a wait.
Barak's order did not address whether the 100 or so West Bank residents caught in Gaza will be allowed to return to their homes. Israel's government has likened Gaza to a foreign country in court papers and maintains that it has no legal obligation to allow Palestinians to cross Israeli territory to reach the West Bank.
"We're not going to leave people in Gaza, especially those who traveled there with our permission," Dror said.
As U.N. agencies warned of food shortages in Gaza in as little as two weeks unless the crossings open for regular cargo deliveries, Israel sent in truckloads of flour, cooking oil, milk, meat and other basic foodstuffs. A batch of U.N.-sponsored vaccines was part of the shipment.
Israel also began allowing Palestinians holding foreign passports to leave Gaza at the request of their embassies. On Wednesday, about 200 people with Russian and Ukrainian passports, most of them women and children, crossed after an hours-long wait.
Israeli officials said plans were being made to allow scores of Palestinians holding U.S. passports to leave Gaza soon.
