The United States renewed its travel warnings for Israel over the weekend, as it has done for the past several years. The specific list of areas in which Americans were told to exercise caution included “Israel, Jerusalem, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.”
Despite the fact that Jerusalem is unequivocally the capital of the State of Israel, "Jerusalem" and "Israel" both are referred to as separate entities throughout the text.
A more pointed reminder about the Palestinian Authority areas was repeated several times in the otherwise standard travelers warning, and a specific instruction to leave Gaza was underscored. “This recommendation applies to all Americans, including journalists and aid workers,” it said.
The State Department notes that it has strongly urged Americans to stay out of Gaza “since the deadly roadside bombing of a U.S. Embassy convoy in Gaza in October 15, 2003.” That attack left three Americans dead and a fourth injured in a convoy that was carrying U.S. diplomats to the region. An outraged President George W. Bush placed the blame for the attack squarely at the doorstep of PA officials, saying "they should have acted long ago to fight terror in all its forms."
The latest warning makes mention of the “violent demonstrations, kidnappings and shootings” in Gaza and the PA-controlled areas of Judea and Samaria, and points out that “The American International School in northern Gaza was the target of an attack on April 21, 2007.”
U.S. citizens are also warned that there may be greater danger “in the vicinity of restaurants, businesses and other places associated with U.S. interests and/or located near U.S. official buildings and are told to avoid large crowds whenever possible.
The warning also includes a sparse list of approved highways on which it is considered safe for American citizens, particularly government workers, to travel from one end of the country to the other – in daylight hours only.
It ends with the caveat that any American citizen who chooses to ignore the warning does so at his own risk, saying “the ability of consular staff to offer timely assistance to U.S. citizens is extremely limited, particularly in the Gaza Strip.”
