Egypt has denied that it has agreed with Israel to reopen the crucial Rafah border crossing with the Gaza Strip, an Egyptian TV channel reported on Friday.
Earlier this month, Israel took control of the Gaza side of the Rafah crossing with Egypt, in an operation that halted aid deliveries through the facility to the densely populated coastal strip.
Citing a high-level source, Egypt’s state-affiliated al-Qahera News TV said Friday that “there is no truth” in media reports about an Egyptian-Israeli deal to reopen the border crossing.
“Egypt is pushing for a full Israeli withdrawal from the border crossing as a condition for resuming its work,” the source said.
Since the closure of the border crossing, Egypt has indicated that it will not coordinate aid shipments through Rafah until Israeli forces withdraw.
Egypt was the first Arab country to sign a peace treaty with Israel in 1979. But the ongoing military campaign in Gaza has fueled anti-Israel sentiment in the Arab world’s most populous country and apparently strained their decades-long ties.
Cairo is also concerned that an expansion of Israel’s offensive in the southern Gaza city of Rafah, where many refugees are fleeing the fighting, could trigger a mass exodus to Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula.
Israel views Rafah as the last stronghold of the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas, which killed hundreds of civilians in Israel last October.
