GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip — They squander their days watching TV and surfing the Web instead of studying, but it’s not for lack of discipline: Gaza students accepted at foreign universities are stuck at home because Israel and Egypt won’t let them leave the blockaded territory.
The students’ plight made headlines recently when Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice interceded with Israel on behalf of seven students with prestigious Fulbright scholarships awarded by the U.S. government. But hundreds of others will probably lose their shot at a good education.
“This is not about seven students; it’s about hundreds of students, 1.5 million people and the future of Gaza,” said Sari Bashi, head of the Israeli human rights group Gisha, which is taking the government to court over the travel ban.
The blockade, imposed after Hamas’ violent takeover of Gaza a year ago, is meant to bring down the Islamic militants and inspire Gazans to opt for a more moderate leadership. But critics say the closure, backed by the international community, is accomplishing the opposite.
Hamas has become more entrenched, and Gazans are growing more angry at the West as isolation worsens the strip’s poverty, say the critics, both Israelis and Palestinians. They add that Gaza is also being robbed of future leaders — the trapped students — because they can’t get the necessary training.
“I feel that I’m lost,” said Ahmed Nasrallah, who studied computer programming in London but has been stuck in Gaza since a summer visit home last year. “I am a victim of a battle that I am not part of.”
Israel says it’s sticking to the principle of only letting out humanitarian hardship cases, such as patients requiring urgent medical treatment.
“Students are not humanitarian cases,” Sagi Krispin, a legal adviser to Israel’s Defense Ministry, told a parliamentary committee.
Israel has not been consistent in this approach, though. In December, about 1,100 students applied for exit permits, and of those, 480 left on special shuttle buses, Gisha said.
Since January, just a few students have been able to get out, hundreds remain stuck and Israel has stopped taking requests altogether, Gisha said.
A Palestinian border official, Mohammed Arafat, estimated Saturday that more than 1,000 Gaza students want to leave the territory.
Maj. Peter Lerner, an Israeli spokesman, said Friday that the cases of some of the students would be reviewed and that priority would be given to recipients of foreign government scholarships. He said he expected several dozen exit permits to be granted, but not hundreds.
