All but one of the 137 Filipinos in war-torn Gaza have been evacuated after 14 of them left the Palestinian enclave through the Rafah border crossing into Egypt on Sunday, the Department of Foreign Affairs said last night.
The Filipinos will be brought to the Philippine Embassy in Cairo in Egypt before sending them on their way to Manila, DFA Undersecretary Eduardo De Vega told GMA News.
The lone Filipino left in Gaza is a Catholic nun who chose to not be repatriated amid the Hamas terrorist group’s battles with the Israeli Defense Force in the territory, De Vega said.
Prospects for an Israel-Hamas ceasefire dimmed Sunday after the United States signaled it would veto the latest push for a United Nations Security Council resolution and mediator Qatar acknowledged that separate truce talks have hit an impasse.
Efforts to pause the over four-month-old war languished as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed to reject international appeals to spare Gaza’s southernmost city of Rafah, where around 1.4 million people have sought refuge.
Israel’s relentless campaign against Hamas militants has edged closer to the city, with attacks killing at least 10 people there and in central Gaza’s Deir al-Balah overnight to Sunday, according to the official Palestinian news agency Wafa. With AFP