Israel fully reopened the Rafah border crossing between Gaza and Egypt on Monday for pedestrians, a day after rolling out a limited pilot test to sort through unforeseen logistics issues.
Collectively, the Sunday-Monday rollout allows Palestinians to leave the enclave and to let back in certain Gazans who fled during the Israel-Hamas War.
Sunday’s opening for a very small number of Palestinians was mostly intended to help the three-fold Israeli, European Union Border Assistance Mission (EUBAM), and Palestinian officials involved figure out some of the inevitable holes in the process on the ground from such a large and complex undertaking.
Monday’s opening was expected to allow the maximum number of persons through the crossing set under the Trump administration’s ceasefire deal.
Even this full opening is limited in some respects, however, with Israel requiring security checks for Palestinians entering and exiting. Jerusalem and Cairo were also expected to impose some kind of unannounced caps on the number of travelers, although the amount of daily crossers was expected to be substantial.
IDF outlines response to Rafah crossing opening
Last week, addressing the Rafah crossing opening, the IDF delineated a complex arrangement of border checks.
According to the plan, EUBAM will handle the main border checks for the Rafah crossing going in and out of Gaza, reportedly with some Palestinian involvement.
The IDF will do a second round of physical checks of all those entering Gaza after the EUBAM check. For those exiting Gaza for Egypt, the IDF will not undertake any physical checks but will have video cameras taking pictures of the faces of all those exiting.
In addition, military sources recommended that despite all of the authority being passed on to the Palestinian technocratic committee, EUBAM, and the International Stabilization Force, the IDF should avoid a complete withdrawal from the Philadelphi Corridor near the Rafah crossing.
Israel cut off Gaza immediately after the October 7 massacre in 2023. After several weeks, it started to open certain crossings to facilitate the transfer of humanitarian aid and pressed Egypt to do so with Rafah.
Egypt closed the Rafah crossing
Despite Israeli and US requests, Egypt closed the Rafah crossing soon after the war began. Israel accused Egypt of doing so to pressure Jerusalem into being the sole source of humanitarian aid for Gaza and to protest the IDF’s counterattack on Hamas.
In May 2024, Israel seized the border crossing.
From May 2024 until US President Donald Trump’s October 2025 ceasefire, Jerusalem and Cairo haggled over potentially opening the crossing. Neither side agreed to the other’s terms, although the crossing opened on a limited basis during the January-March 2025 temporary ceasefire.
For example, Egypt wanted the Palestinian Authority involved in the crossing, which Israel objected to at the time but is now allowing on a limited basis.
Palestinian officials say about 100,000 Palestinians fled Gaza since the war began, most of them during the conflict’s first nine months. Some were sponsored by aid groups, while others paid bribes to parties in Egypt to secure permission to leave.
The closure of the Rafah crossing cut off an important route for wounded and sick Palestinians to seek medical care outside of Gaza. Israel allowed a few thousand to seek medical treatment in third countries via its own border over the past year. Thousands more are in need of care abroad, according to the United Nations.
Despite the reopening of Rafah, Israel is still limiting the entry of foreign and Israeli journalists and insisting on supervising their visits.
The High Court of Justice is considering a petition by the Foreign Press Association that demands foreign journalists be allowed to enter Gaza from Israel in unlimited numbers and without supervision.
Government lawyers have said letting journalists into Gaza could pose risks to Israeli soldiers. They also have cited potential risks to reporters, albeit in a more circumspect way since the October 2025 ceasefire.
Reuters contributed to this story.