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Halt in passport process restricts Palestinian movement

Some students and people seeking treatment in Gaza are unable to travel as they wait for their passports to be issued or renewed, while the Ministry of Interior slowly works on sorting out the procedure.
A passenger hands back passports to Palestinians waiting to cross into Egypt at the Rafah border crossing in the southern Gaza Strip June 1, 2010. Egypt opened its border with the Gaza Strip on Tuesday, letting Palestinians cross until further notice amid a storm of international criticism of Israel's blockade of the enclave, officials in Egypt and Gaza said. REUTERS/Mohammed Salem (GAZA - Tags: POLITICS) - RTR2EN6J
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GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip — In February, Suleiman al-Dali, a student, lost a scholarship to study for a bachelor’s degree in engineering in Turkey after the Interior Ministry in the West Bank stopped issuing passports to residents of the Gaza Strip that month. Dali, who has a diploma in interior design from the University College of Applied Sciences in Gaza, had waited a long time and endured various hardships before being accepted into the Turkish program after fulfilling all the requirements.

He told Al-Monitor, “After I was accepted, I began the official procedures to finalize my papers and prepare for my travel to Turkey. More than three months ago, I applied to the Interior Ministry in Ramallah, through its services office in Gaza, to renew my passport, which was set to expire in a few months. However, the scholarship’s deadline passed [without my traveling to Turkey] because the passport was not renewed, under the pretext that they didn’t have passport booklets [in Gaza]. I, therefore, lost the scholarship, which for me was like a dream that suddenly turned into a mirage.” 

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