The Israeli-Palestinian Interaction at the Gaza International Airport: From Bethe-Ade’s Day to Palestine’s Statehood
It’s hard to comprehend today in Tel Aviv. But once the Gaza Strip was calm enough to host a U.S. president, and Palestinian statehood seemed a real possibility.
The day was Dec. 14, 1998, and the mood was upbeat. President Bill Clinton and first lady Hillary Clinton stood next to Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat and his wife to cut the ribbon inaugurating the Gaza International Airport in the southeast corner of the territory.
“Hillary and I, along with Chairman and Mrs. Arafat celebrated a place that will become a magnet for planes from throughout the Middle East and beyond,” Clinton said. “A future in which Palestinians can travel directly to the far corners of the world.”
For many Palestinians, the airport symbolized the larger effort to establish a Palestinian state that would include Gaza and the West Bank, with a capital in East Jerusalem. By this time, the Israelis and Palestinians had been negotiating for five years under the 1993 Oslo Accords. The start-and-stop process was very good, but the airport was a clear sign of what was to come.
“My father and his friends were from the business community. After they visited the airport, my father came to our house, and said, ‘Taghreed, it will happen. A Palestinian state is going to happen. Now I believe it.’”
I traveled from Jerusalem to Gaza over a seven year period. El-Khodary was my guide and he was familiar with almost everyone there. She is currently working as a journalist in Amsterdam, where she lives with her two children, an 11, and a 10 year old, and that is where I reached her.
I would enter Gaza through the Erez crossing, which is the same border post Palestinians used to leave in a rush-hour scene.
More than 100,000Palestinian workers were allowed into Israel. But they had to pass through stringent Israeli security checks as part of a commute that could last three hours or more each way.
At the stroke of 3, the crossing opened and nighttime stillness turned into rush-hour madness, reflecting the fraught Israeli-Palestinian relations even during those times when they were cooperating.
The rise of Hamas was a big part of the story in the early 2000s.
Hamas leaders in Gaza were murdered by Israel, but they were very casual about their security. El-Khodary would call them up, and then we’d go knock on the front door of their homes.
In 2005, after a Palestinian uprising, or intifada, that lasted five years, it seemed Gaza might calm down, at least a bit, as Israel withdrew Jewish settlers and troops from the territory after a presence of nearly 40 years.
At that time El-Khodary was going to Harvard to work as a journalist. It was a dramatic change from the confines of Gaza.
The War between Israel and Hamas in Gaza During the 2001 Israeli-Military War: Is My Family in Gaza?
“You are exposed to all this freedom of movement and universal values and all of that you learn in American schools,” she says. “You get this stimulation and it’s just so powerful.”
The Rafah border crossing between Egypt and the southern end of Gaza was closed. El-Khodary was stuck on the Egyptian side, unable to return home to Gaza — for 39 days.
Something else happened while she was away. The Palestinians held an election — and Hamas won, overtaking Fatah, the dominant Palestinian faction for decades.
The consequences were immediately clear. Since then, Israel and Hamas have fought every few years, though the Israeli aim was to weaken the militant group, not to drive it from power or eliminate it entirely.
“I haven’t left Gaza because all my family is in Gaza, all my friends. I just learned that my music teacher from elementary school was killed,” she says. “It’s just so sad that I cannot help them. I used to work in the news business. My family is part of the story.
She would like them to join her. There are no flights out of Gaza anymore. The Gaza International Airport was closed in 2001 due to fighting.
Up First Briefing: Remembering Rosalynn Carter; Sam Altman heads to Microsoft (New York Times 83, 020413), a tribute to Jimmy Carter
Good morning. The newsletter is called Up First. You can subscribe to the newsletter and listen to the Up First app for the best news of the day.
Carter died at her home in Plains, Georgia. She was in her 90’s. Carter, who was known as Steel Magnolia, spent his life as a mental health advocate and humanitarian. Former president Jimmy Carter is 99 years old and has been in hospice care since February.
Israel and Hamas are inching toward a deal to release some of the roughly 240 hostages taken from Israel in the Oct. 7 attacks. Yesterday, aid workers successfully evacuated some 30 remaining premature babies from Gaza’s Al-Shifa Hospital, which is currently controlled by Israel. U.N. representatives described Al-Shifa, Gaza’s largest hospital, as a “death zone.”
Source: Up First briefing: Remembering Rosalynn Carter; Sam Altman heads to Microsoft
Up First Briefing: Remembering Rosalynn Carter; Sam Altman Heads to Microsoft (after Steve Altman and Micky Maldacena)
The people of Argentina elected Milei as their next president. The far-right populist beat Argentina’s economy minister Sergio Massa in a runoff election. Milei’s style has drawn comparisons to former U.S. president Donald Trump.
The influential creator of the chat gppt Sam Altman will lead a new artificial intelligence team at Microsoft. The Board of Directors of Openai abruptly ousted their founder, Steve Altman, over an apparent rift between balancing safety and releasing new tools.
Billy Porter is the first openly gay Black man to win an Emmy. He’s won several Tonys and has a gramophone. But when he first came to prominence in 1992, Porter says he was told his queerness was a liability. The artist is making his own music for his new album.
Source: Up First briefing: Remembering Rosalynn Carter; Sam Altman heads to Microsoft
Ziva Jelin’s Artwork at the Israel Museum During a World War II: A Portrait of a Resolved Work of an Artist
Artist Ziva Jelin was living in Kibbutz Be’eri when Hamas attacked Israel on Oct. 7. When her family was rescued and evacuated to a hotel at the Dead Sea, her artwork wasn’t a priority. Now, her work takes on new meaning at a special display in the Israel Museum in Jerusalem.