Sanaa El-Nahhal's mission to enter the Gaza Strip has been accomplished although most of the supplies she was carrying for the stricken zone will follow later from Egypt. Now, the problem is she cannot get out.
Ms El-Nahhal is ready and waiting, her bags packed, at her sister's, about 10 minutes away from the border. All she needs is a document that would give her the green light to re-enter Egypt, her family in Malta said.
Ms El-Nahhal has been waiting for the go-ahead since Wednesday. Now that she managed to get into the Gaza Strip, which until a ceasefire on Sunday was under siege from Israel, she is anxious to get out.
"She is happy to have seen her father and her siblings, but is uncertain and afraid of what could happen tomorrow and the day after, and is feeling trapped," her husband Khalid El-Nahhal said.
"As long as there is no fighting, it is not such a problem, but she wants to leave sooner, rather than later," he said.
Mr El-Nahhal is also anxious for her to get out and said the Maltese Ambassador in Cairo contacted him a number of times yesterday to reassure the family that he was doing his utmost and had spoken to the Egyptian Foreign Affairs Minister.
Ms El-Nahhal has a flight to catch back to Malta from Egypt on Sunday and believes that the sooner she is out of Palestine, the likelier she is to be able to catch it.
She left for Egypt on Sunday to transport 60 boxes of medicines, food and clothing, donated by the government and the Maltese, to her conflict-ridden homeland.
At the Egyptian crossing in Rafah, she had to wait for a document to enter the Gaza Strip, and now she is waiting for one to exit.
Entering as a citizen of Gaza, she had to leave most of the supplies - some 850 kilograms - behind in a store. But once the borders open up regularly, they should be taken across, her husband said. The medicines would be transported to their destination by the Red Crescent Society, he added. Ms El-Nahhal's mission to provide the aid cargo marked a major stride when she managed to get into the Gaza Strip on Monday afternoon, despite having considered it to be impossible. After waiting at the Rafah border in Egypt since the early hours, she had finally got through.