The fact that I was one of the few in the world that can actually visit and see Gaza, then, makes my recent July vacation there with my family all the more special. Its beautiful beach, amazing food, and wonderful people made my trip there one of the most incredible experiences of my life.
Yet I, like any Palestinian who wants to travel to Gaza with a hawiyya, had to forgo any expectation of having my basic human rights respected. Instead, I experienced consistent humiliation, utter exhaustion, and total confusion. What should have taken hours took days, slowed down by uninterested and scornful Egyptian border agents, purposefully mismanaged crowds, and a sweeping attitude of dehumanization toward the Palestinians trying to reach their homeland.
‘We know what might happen if you disobey’
For Palestinians trying to return to their besieged home, the Sinai is the only available route they can take. Because Egypt publicly demonstrates “high-level ties” with Israel as they keep tabs on all Palestinians entering Gaza, travelers have to endure constant and consistent abuse from Egyptian authorities along the way.
To travel to Gaza via Egypt, you first have to reach Cairo and hire a driver who will take you to the Rafah Border Crossing. Although this leg of the journey seems simple enough, a drive that is supposed to take only five hours across the Sinai took, instead, two whole days.
This is because Egypt treats Sinai as a war zone. The government’s “war on terror” has turned a once-beautiful area of Egypt into a hyper-militarized zone with checkpoints every few kilometers. Instead of thriving cities close to the Mediterranean, the Sinai Peninsula is filled with military tanks, evacuated homes riddled with bullet holes, and soldiers stationed at every turn.