(15 Feb 2025)
RESTRICTION SUMMARY:
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Rafah border crossing, Egypt – 15 February 2025
++AUDIO AS INCOMING++
1. Various of Arab League delegation at Rafah border crossing between Egypt and Gaza Strip, line of ambulances in background
2. SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Hossam Zaki, Arab League Assistant Secretary-General:
“Unfortunately, the pace of aid entry is not acceptable, neither humanitarianly, morally, nor in any other way. From here, we continuously call on the international community to maintain pressure on the Israeli side, the occupation forces, to allow the entry of aid that is already at the border crossing. You are all present and can see the massive number of aid trucks, hundreds of them lined up in long queues, ready to enter.“
3. Various of Egyptian Health Minister Khaled Abdel Ghaffar (left) greeting members of EU delegation
4. European Parliament Progressive Alliance delegation member Iratxe Garcia Perez in discussion
5. Various of Garcia Perez with Palestinian mother and children inside back of ambulance ++PART MUTE++
6. SOUNDBITE (English) Iratxe Garcia Perez, European Parliament Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats delegation member:
“We will continue our mission. We started here today in Rafah, we will continue in Jerusalem. We will have meetings with the Israeli government. We will have a meeting with the Palestinian authorities, we will meet with the civil society and with organizations and we will end this mission in Lebanon. After that we are going to come back to the European Parliament, we will prepare our evaluation about the mission of course, to share first of all in our group and after that continue our work to guarantee that the European Parliament will be a clear voice, a clear voice to defend the two-state solution and to defend human rights.“
7. EU delegation at border crossing
8. SOUNDBITE (English) Iratxe Garcia Perez, European Parliament Progressive Alliance delegation member:
“We need to be united and we need to have a clear voice and we cannot admit double standards. If we are defending human rights and we are defending territories’ sovereignty in other places, we have to do the same here in the Middle East and this will be our clear position as a Social Democratic group in the European Parliament.“
9. Various of EU delegation at border crossing
STORYLINE:
A delegation of European Parliament lawmakers visited the Egyptian side of the Rafah border with the Gaza Strip on Saturday.
The group from the Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats were beginning a Middle East visit which will also take them to Israel and Lebanon.
They were met at the border crossing by Egyptian and Arab League officials.
Arab League Assistant Secretary-General Hossam Zaki said the rate of aid trucks being allowed into Gaza amid the ongoing ceasefire was "not acceptable".
He urged the international community to put pressure on Israeli authorities to increase the flow.
Earlier this week Hamas had accused Israel of delaying delivery of tents, pre-fabricated homes and heavy machinery into the devastated territory, saying it would delay the scheduled release of three hostages if it was not resolved by this weekend.
Israel has rejected the accusations, and the hostage release and prisoner swap went ahead as scheduled on Saturday.
Iratxe Garcia Perez, a Spanish member of the European Parliament who was part of the visiting delegation, said the group had to have a "clear voice" for defending the human rights of Palestinians and the two-state solution.
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