November 15th, 2005

Hey guys,
So this morning on Haaretz (www.haaretz.com) I saw a headline that was
bold and underlined and said "Israel and PA clinch deal on Gaza-Egypt
border". This is a really big deal. To summarize:

What's been going on is that Israeli and Palestinian officials have
been trying to figure out how the Gaza-Egypt border is going to work.
Rice (the U.S. Secretary of State) has reported that an agreement has
been made. It has been decided that on November 25, the border will
open, and a gaza seaport will begin to be created--and Palestinians
will be allowed to travel from the West Bank to Gaza, through Israel,
as long as they are in convoys, starting December 15. Rice feels that
this is a huge deal, for many reasons including the fact that for
the first time, the Palestinians will have control over a border,
and be able to start reparing the Gaza economy. This agreement also
helps move Abbas (the Palestinian leader) ahead of Hamas for the
January 25 elections.

Israel stated that by the end of the year, at least 150 truckloads of
cargo will be allowed to be exported from Gaza crossing into Israel,
compared to the 35 truckloads that were crossing before the pullout.

Props to the Rice and the U.S. for being really committed to security
and helping Israel maintain that security. 

It has been decided that Palestinian officials will be at the crossing
between Israel and Gaza to inspect, but Israeli officials will be able
to inspect the goods passing through. In terms of the Egypt-Gaza
border, there will be video-monitoring by Israeli officials.

So it looks like this made peace seem a little bit more possible and
probable. Let's all keep hoping.

B'ahavah,
Jen Kracoff
Natick USY Israel Affairs Vice-President