Conflict Blotter

A pair of articles today and yesterday about Palestinians fleeing the Gaza Strip. Maariv says today that over 14,000 Palestinians, over one percent of the population, have left the Gaza Strip since the Israeli disengagement. It arrived at those numbers by tallying the total number of Palestinians who left Gaza through the Rafah border crossing since it was reopened (226,396) and subtracting the number of Palestinians who passed back into Gaza through the crossing (212,660). I guess the numbers come from the EU monitors there, but not sure.

Yesterday the Jerusalem Post’s Khaled Abu Toameh reported that the Palestinian Authority’s muft had issued a fatwa forbidding Palestinian Muslims to leave the country.

I’ll have more on this later today hopefully.

UPDATE: I spoke with EU Rafah border crossing monitors and the above statistics did indeed come from the EU and are solid.

UPDATE: Here is are some quotes from the fatwa by Jerusalem mufti Mohammad Ahmed Hussein (I have not seen the original Arabic and this is not my translation):

There is a trend among youth asking for visas from Western embassies, with intention to live permanently abroad. Immigration should be to this land and not from this land. The prophet says no immigration after the Muslim conquests, but only Jihad.

The prophet and his followers, scholars, the Mujahedeen and holy people say to stay in this land because it is the land of Ribat, the frontline. (Ribat? A Koranic bit of vocab I’m not quite familiar with, but which my translator says is equivalent to “frontline.”)

Immigration from this blessed land to other countries with the intent to live there permanently is not permissible by Sharia. The people who live in these land should not leave it for the invaders and occupiers.