CAIRO: The North Sinai governor Ahmed Abdel-Hameed met with local elders in Rafah Thursday night to convince them to call off a demonstration planned for the following day. The governor succeeded and asked for more time to address the residents' long-standing concerns, Tagammu party member and former parliamentary candidate Hussein El Qayem told Daily News Egypt. They agreed to give him a week, El Qayem added. Residents of Rafah and the neighboring area of Maassura are demanding that the government rescind a plan to evacuate buildings 150 meters from the Gaza border, as well as release incarcerated locals arrested after the numerous Sinai bombings over the past few years. They also asked for the introduction of basic infrastructure like electricity still not available in many areas. They further voiced their call for justice for the murder of 15-year-old Ouda Mohammed Ouda Arafat, who was killed earlier this month in an anti-government demonstration. Clashes between Bedouins and police had led to the injury of 15 others. El Qayem said that the deceased boy's father had been warned by local NDP officials not to press charges against the Interior Ministry. "They tell him, what are you possibly going to achieve against the government? El Qayem said. "They [the NDP] are also going around telling people that more arrests are imminent to scare them off further action, he added. In other news, the Egyptian foreign ministry released a statement refuting a report in Al-Quds Al-Arabi newspaper which claimed there was a possibility of the Egyptian military temporarily taking control of Palestinian Authority security posts in Gaza, while Fatah and Hamas tried to broker a new deal. The foreign ministry statement said these claims were "groundless and that "Egypt could not interfere in internal Palestinian questions. Hamas had also refuted the newspaper's report. Additionally, the pan-Arab newspaper Al Hayat stated that Egypt had refused an Israeli request to have their envoys return to Gaza to help secure the release of captured Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit. According to the newspaper, Egypt was not willing to send any envoys to Gaza until Hamas, which took over Gaza two months ago after clashes with Fatah, rescinded its control over the Strip. The Egyptians reportedly told Ofer Dekel, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert s envoy for prisoner negotiations, that "the matter of the situation in Gaza is more important to us than the Gilad Shalit issue, the newspaper reported.
