It is one of the most densely populated areas in the world: more or less four thousand people per square kilometre, but it is an open-air prison.
The Gaza Strip , the Palestinian enclave from which Hamas ‘ recent military operation against Israel began , is a portion of territory approximately 360 square kilometers wide located north-east of the Sinai Peninsula. It borders Egypt to the west, while it overlooks the Mediterranean Sea to the north. To the south and east is Israel. The inhabitants are around two million, a number which makes the Gaza Strip one of the most densely populated areas in the world: more or less four thousand people per square kilometre. This band of territory constitutes the smallest portion of the Palestinian territories : the larger one is called the West Bank or West Bank. Separating them is Israel.
The situation:
History
Conquered over the centuries by Alexander the Great and the Romans, the profile of the Gaza Strip as we know it today began to take shape following the end of the First World War. After the defeat of the Ottoman Empire which presided over the area, in 1918 the League of Nations (a body similar to the current United Nations which operated in those years) entrusted the management of the territory to the British administration . Exactly thirty years later, coinciding with the creation of the State of Israel and the end of the British mandate, Egypt occupied Gaza.
Palestinian refugees who fled due to the 1948 Arab-Israeli war had settled in that area . Cairo was responsible for the Strip until 1967, when Israel managed to occupy it during the so-called Six-Day War . The conflict pitted Egypt and Syria against Israel, which on that occasion proved capable of repelling its enemies to the point of conquering new territories, including part of the West Bank.
The Oslo Accords
The Israeli presence in the Gaza Strip lasted until 2005 when, under pressure from the international community, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon withdrew the military forces and the colonial settlements developed over forty years of occupation. As established by the 1993 Oslo Accords , Gaza was to be controlled by the Palestinian National Authority (PNA), with which Tel Aviv had made the pact. In 2006, however, the armed Islamist party Hamas won the elections in the Strip . This event led Israel to impose, in 2007, the embargo of Palestinian skies and seas and the control of people and goods entering and exiting. In this way, Tel Aviv has achieved a strong impoverishment of the area and a deterioration of essential services.
As NBC explains today , the International Red Cross has declared the embargo illegal as “ collective punishment for people living in the Gaza Strip “. This constitutes a violation of the Fourth Geneva Convention, which is intended to protect civilians who find themselves in enemy hands or in occupied territory. If the civilians of the Strip are put in difficulty by the Israeli blockades, Egypt also plays its part: Cairo has repeatedly closed its borders to Gazans . A small part of them leave the Palestinian enclave every day to go to work in Israel, but once their shift is over the return is mandatory. Other citizens of the Strip are not allowed to cross the borders except in extreme cases, such as the need for treatment. Last year the non-governmental organization Human Rights Watch described Gaza as “ an open-air prison “.
With its restrictions on the Strip, Israel wanted to weaken Hamas. However, the measure had the opposite effect: social anger grew more and more, inducing a large part of the Gaza population (very young on average) to see the terrorist organization as the only alternative to Israeli violence and political incapacity. of the PNA .
