Gaza’s Hamas rulers on Sunday closed the Rafah border crossing after guards on the Egyptian side fled their posts amid the spiralling unrest gripping the country.
As the angry revolt against President Hosni Mubarak entered its sixth day, Hamas officials announced the Rafah crossing would be closed for “several days,” preventing hundreds of Palestinians from crossing into Egypt.
The move came after Egyptian troops stationed on their side of the crossing fled during the border’s normal closure at the weekend, as angry protesters rampaged across the country.
Every day between 400 and 500 people cross from Gaza into Egypt.
The closure was likely to keep thousands of people trapped inside the Gaza Strip, while the lack of personnel on the Egyptian side of the divided border town of Rafah would also prevent hundreds of Gazans from returning home.
With the crossing closed, Hamas bolstered its forces along the border, deploying hundreds of troops compared with the usual number of around 50.
The Islamist movement has so far given no official reaction to the crisis in Egypt, where more than 125 people have been killed in the biggest demonstrations to sweep the country in more than 30 years.
But the closed border did not prevent at least two Hamas security prisoners from returning to the Strip after escaping from a jail near Cairo as Egyptian authorities struggled to maintain a grip on law and order.
The two, who entered Gaza through cross-border smuggling tunnels, were part of a group of eight escaped Hamas convicts trying to return home, a senior official with the movement said on condition of anonymity.
The prisoners made their escape when thousands broke out of jails across Egypt amid an absence of police and chaos sparked by nationwide riots demanding the end of Mubarak’s regime.
Among those who returned on Sunday was Mohammed al-Shaer, a big name on the cross-border smuggling scene, arrested six months ago, and Hassan Wishah, who served three years of a 10-year term for unspecified security offences.
The remaining six prisoners were said to have reached Egypt’s port city of El-Arish and were expected to reach Gaza later, official sources said.
Although the prisoners managed to enter the enclave by tunnel, most other movement of goods through the underground network ground to a halt on Sunday, sparking fears of a fuel shortage in the Israeli-blockaded territory.
Abu Abed Alwahab, a Hamas border guard carrying a Kalashnikov assault rifle, said, however, that tunnel workers were being allowed into the frontier zone.
“Our mission is to protect the border,” he said. “We prevent anyone from coming near, except for some workers in the tunnels.”
A man who identified himself only as Samih, aged 30, was carrying earth from the entrance to a tunnel which he said had been put out of operation by a partial collapse caused by rainwater.
“I am working to repair it,” he said, adding that he heard shots from the Egyptian side, “but there was more yesterday than today.”
Nineteen-year-old Samir was working in another tunnel nearby.
“If the tunnels are closed it means no fuel, no cement, no goods to Gaza,” he said.
Long queues formed at outlets selling fuel as Gazans began to stockpile petrol and diesel over fears that supplies from Egypt could be cut back, witnesses said.
Although most of Gaza’s fuel supplies are brought in through the tunnels, the Hamas-run economy ministry insisted there was no shortage and called for an end to panic-buying.
“There is enough fuel in the stores and enough food. We urge people not to worry about fuel or other goods,” it said in a statement.