This article was originally published by the Maan News and is republished with permission.

Hundreds of Gazan students, patients and businesspeople and workers continued a sit-in for a ninth day in front of the Egyptian interior ministry's offices in the Sinai region on Thursday. They are demanding that Egyptian authorities let them pass to the international airport in Cairo so they can fly to their destinations abroad.

One of those stranded at in the city of Al-Arish, Abdul-Rahman Dallul, told Ma'an in a telephone interview that he demand the Egyptians, the Palestinians and the Arab countries find a solution to their predicament soon because the protesters are suffering from in this winter’s exceptionally cold weather.

Since last Wednesday, hundreds of thousands of Gazans crossed the newly-opened border, mainly to shop for supplies made scarce by the Israeli blockade of the territory.

Most of the Gaza Strip’s 1.5 million residents have been trapped in side the Strip by Israeli closure policy since last June. Among them are thousands of students enrolled in foreign universities, people who work abroad, and patients in need of medical treatments not available inside Gaza.