LESSONS LEARNED FROM EMBASSY CAIRO'S EVACUATION OF AMERICAN

UNCLAS CAIRO 000205


FOR CA/OCS/ACS/NESA KIM RICHTER, CA/OCS/CM KAREN ZARESKI, DS/IP/NEA,
NEA/IPA AND NEA/ELA

E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: CASC PREL PTER ASEC KPAL EG
SUBJECT: LESSONS LEARNED FROM EMBASSY CAIRO'S EVACUATION OF AMERICAN
CITIZENS FROM GAZA


1. Summary: Embassy Cairo evacuated four families with American
citizens and family members entitled to immigrant visas, and
assisted in the evacuation of over 100 foreign nationals on January
19, 2009. The evacuation went smoothly and lessons learned follow.
End Summary.


2. On January 19, 2009 sixteen Embassy Cairo employees assembled at
0415 at the Embassy in order to evacuate four American families and
over 100 foreign nationals from Gaza. Fighting in Gaza had closed
the borders and trapped these evacuees in a dangerous situation.
Embassy Tel Aviv had organized the evacuation of foreign nationals
within Gaza, and Embassy Cairo had assumed the task of coordinating
the various missions from the Rafah border back to Cairo. Weeks of
negotiations between embassies in Cairo and the Egyptian MFA and MoI
had resulted in clearances for the foreign nationals to cross into
Egypt.


3. Lesson 1 - check, check and recheck. Embassy Cairo worked with
Embassy Tel Aviv on a possible International Committee of the Red
Crescent (ICRC) escort within Gaza for our evacuees. In the end the
ICRC did not have the resources to provide escort, and many of the
foreign evacuees chose not to go at the last minute due to security
concerns about the safety of travel within Gaza. This was out of
our control, but in future we should be very blunt with other
missions that escort inside Gaza is not guaranteed and evacuees
should plan accordingly. We also brought our satellite phone with
us to test at Rafah. We and RSO tried to make it work, but we were
not successful. In the future we will check on our sat phone before
we have a crisis!


4. Embassy Cairo assessed the security situation in Rafah ahead of
time and determined appropriate procedures for the trip. Embassy
Cairo sent the Consul General, ACS Chief, three experienced ACS LES,
three A/RSOs and two RSO LES, in addition to three Embassy drivers
familiar with the drive to Rafah to assist in the evacuation. GSO
provided immense support in logistics and arranging for two large
buses for the convoy. Embassy Cairo brought ample supplies of
water, food, diapers, toilet paper and paper towels, as well as the
DS-3072 (Evacuation Documentation) and our ever-trustworthy
blackberries.


5. Four foreign consuls accompanied us in the US Embassy vans due to
lack of their own personal transportation. The other 10 missions
who wished to participate in the evacuation followed our motorcade
in 20 additional vehicles. Needless to say this made for an
extremely long convoy, but to our surprise it held together for the
entire six-hour trip to Rafah with no issues en route.


6. Lesson 2 - Think locally. Once at the Rafah border we quickly
learned our second lesson - all lists of evacuee names should be
provided in writing translated into the local language. Every
mission present had their lists in English, and we all spent time on
arrival handwriting the lists in Arabic at the request of the border
officials.


7. Lesson 3 - Prepare to wait. Despite three weeks of
pre-clearances and umpteen assurances that our citizens would cross
at the border with no difficulty, we had to start almost from
scratch upon arrival at Rafah. After submitting our lists we
waited, and waited, and waited. Finally buses began to arrive with
foreign nationals. We cannot stress enough the importance of LES in
this evacuation. Their language skills and ability to cross
cultural barriers with the border control officers were invaluable
in getting our citizens across. We were the only mission to
successfully get all of our evacuees out. Every other mission had
to leave citizens behind due to lack of planning, lack of
communication or lack of influence with the Egyptian authorities.
Taking the time over the last year to build relationships with GoE
officials meant that we could call on those contacts in this time of
need.


8. Lesson 4 - Always bring your tools. Hours into the process our
one stumbling block was the lack of documentation for an eight-month
old baby who could not get a passport due to the fighting and
restrictions on travel. In the end the ACS Chief convinced the
passport authorities to let her write a statement that she would be
responsible for all of the Americans entering Egypt. She wrote the
statement, sealed it with her portable hand seal, and the problem
was solved. It sounds strange, but without the hand seal it is not
clear whether the authorities would have let the Amcits enter. Six
long hours after arriving in Rafah we departed with 10 Amcits, 9
Romanian citizens, 5 Turkish citizens and 5 Irish citizens in our
vehicles, plus over 100 other nationals, who departed with their
Consuls seperately. We all arrived back in Cairo around 2300, tired
but satisfied with a successful mission completed.

Scobey