The Brazilian government has asked the Israeli government to maintain a refuge in the Gaza Strip, where 13 Brazilians are sheltering and waiting for the opportunity to repatriate. The appeal was made by Itamaraty, the Brazilian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, but received no response from the Israeli authorities.
This small group of Brazilians, most of them children and women, were taken by Brazilian diplomats in the Gaza Strip to the Catholic school Rosary Sister School, located in the far southeast of Gaza City, the capital of the small territory that had been under constant bombardment for six days since the extremist group Hamas, which has ruled the Gaza Strip since 2007, unleashed a wave of deadly attacks on civilians in southern Israel. The school is well known to the Israeli military as the country has already bombed it in 2021 during another armed conflict with the Gaza Strip, alleging that the Catholic community building was being used as a safe haven by Hamas extremists.
Brazil’s call has very little chance of being heard and respected. After the massacre of more than a thousand Israeli citizens and representatives of other nationalities on Saturday by Hamas militants who managed to break through Israeli defenses, the country began a brutal retaliation against the entire Gaza Strip, indiscriminately targeting residential areas, hospitals, schools, and the main port of Gaza. Gaza and even the UN office.
Brazilian diplomats in Brasilia, Israel, Egypt, Palestine and the Gaza Strip have been desperately trying for days to expel the 28 Brazilians seeking help from under constant attack in Gaza, but that possibility appears increasingly difficult and distant. Brazil even managed to get Egypt, the only country other than Israel that has a land border with the Gaza Strip, to help Brazilians escape into Egyptian territory through the Rafah border, but Israeli attacks destroyed this border crossing.
There are currently about 50 Brazilians living in the Gaza Strip, 28 of whom have expressed a desire to leave the territory. Of these 28, 15 did not agree to go to Catholic school, especially because they had been attacked in the past, and preferred to stay close to their Palestinian families.
Other Brazilians on Israeli soil have had better luck, and in just three days Brazil has already repatriated more than 500 people with the help of Brazilian Air Force planes sent to Tel Aviv. The number is estimated to reach 900 by Saturday, but military flights between Brasilia and Tel Aviv will continue and even have to be intensified until the more than 2,700 Brazilians who have expressed a desire to leave Israel are rescued.
Author: Domingos Grilo Serrinha This correspondent in Brazil
Source: CM Jornal
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