There is a palpable fear and tension in communities across the United States already scarred by the violent incidents stemming from the early days of the Israel and Hamas war, with some equating the bigotry and hatred being experienced by Jews, Palestinians, Muslims and other groups across the country to that of a post-9/11 world.
US State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller told CNN that the sporadic presence of Hamas at the Rafah border crossing has made the situation "extremely difficult," but Egyptians are ready to take in US citizens and foreign nationals who make it to their side of the border.
This story first appeared in New York Focus, a non-profit news publication investigating New York state politics. Sign up for their stories at nysfocus.com/newsletter.
It wasn’t until the evening of a “solidarity mission” to Israel, 10 days and more than 4,000 deaths into the ongoing war, that Gov. Kathy Hochul advocated publicly for humanitarian