"All Aboard for the Muslim Brotherhood Express" - Qatar to channel goods via Egypt to rebuild Gaza.(AA).As Israel stops another pro-Palestinian ship carrying humanitarian cargo for Gaza on Saturday, Qatari and Palestinian officials said that their Gulf state will start to channel goods and materials to rebuild Israeli-blockaded Gaza via neighboring Egypt.
Egypt’s Islamist President Mohammed Mursi and the Hamas premier Ismail Haniya, whose movement rules the Gaza Strip, discussed the project in a telephone call, the Palestinian leader's spokesman Taher al-Nunu said.
“The blockage of construction materials and equipment for reconstruction projects in Gaza has been completely lifted. That’s what we were informed by the Egyptian president,”Qatar’s ambassador, Mohammed al-Emadi, told AFP. He said that the materials would enter Gaza through the Rafah border crossing with Egypt. On September 25, the ambassador announced that Qatar was to invest $254 million in Gaza, mostly to build roads, for housing, infrastructure projects and agricultural development. The announcement is considered to be a policy change by Egypt. Egypt has aided Israel to impose a full border closure of Gaza by air, land and sea after Hamas took over the strip and drove out forces loyal to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. Israel eased its restrictions after its raid of a Turkish-led blockade-busting flotilla in 2010 left nine activists dead and sparked international condemnation. An inquiry into that incident commissioned by U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon found that Israel’s Gaza blockade was legal but faulted the navy for excessive force. Palestinians describe the curbs as collective punishment for Gaza’s 1.6 million residents and their supporters abroad have mounted several attempts to break the blockade by sea.Read the full story here.
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