Today was my last day in Gaza, and even though I’m not happy to be leaving, I had a great adventure to round out the trip.

I walked the second half of my two-day trek today, starting at 9 a.m. from Wadi Gaza (“The Gaza Valley”), which is essentially a small sewage stream that runs into the sea.

The walk down the coast was about 25 kilometers, and as I descended further and further south, civilization petered out, giving way to the odd beach hut or tent and a road mostly consumed by desert sand. The walk today was punctuated by a heavy presence of Israeli aircraft, flying low and loud. One of the planes was low enough that I was able to see it sweep from the sea, over Gaza, and into Israel.

Gone Fishing

After stopping for a brief shisha break at 11 (Lay off. Yes, 11 is too early for shisha.), I pressed on until I saw a crowd of fishermen working on a massive net that arched out into the sea. A fisherman myself, I ran across the sand dunes to check out the action.

After watching for several minutes, one of the men implored me to help the group pull the net in. So, in a game of tug of war against the sea currents, I grabbed the rope and began to pull. 50 yards down the beach, another group pulled on their side of the net, slowly closing the loop and bringing the catch to shore.

15 minutes later, though, the men stood around their net looking dejected. For all the effort, they managed to pull in just one fish, a foot long mullet.

The men all thanked me for my help, and I set down the coast again, sweating from the 100-degree heat and grateful to have a floppy sun hat on my head to protect against sunburn.

Salafists Everywhere!

An hour later, somewhere in the stretch of land between Khan Younes and Rafah, I stopped at a small roadside store for water. In the store, I quickly connected with two teenagers from Rafah who, I soon learned, were friends of friends. One of them, it turned out, was the nephew of Dr. Abdel Latif Moussa, the man I wrote about a couple days ago who was gunned down by Hamas last year after he declared Rafah an independent Islamic Emirate.

Moussa, and his nephew Uday (“My father named me after Saddam’s son,” he told me), are Salafists, or members of one of Islam’s most conservative sects. While Hamas is often viewed as the conservative foil to Fatah, Salafists make Hamas look like they’re running the Vegas Strip, not the Gaza Strip.

Uday and his friend Farras walked a kilometer down the road with me until we reached a tent on the beach where all their friends were hanging out. As it turns out, Salafists go to the beach with other Salafists. These guys were all followers of Dr. Moussa.

A few minutes after sitting down and making introductions, we started to talk politics. These guys opposed Hamas because, they said, Hamas has run afoul of Islam. Hamas assassinates its opponents, they said, which is against the principles of Islam. Hamas also tolerates smoking cigarettes, which is prohibited by Islamic law. To make matters worse, Hamas taxes cigarette sales, so they’re essentially profiting off sin.

Our talk grew considerably less pleasant when the conversation turned to my own religious beliefs. I’ve found that most people in Gaza enjoy embracing the cultural differences between Islam and Christianity. “I don’t drink alcohol because of Islam, but it’s cool that you do” is a common refrain. Not with the Salafists. They couldn’t believe that men (let alone women!) in the west drink. They told me they think premarital sex is repulsive. One guy claimed he had a closer relationship with God than I did because his religion requires him to pray five times a day. “Which religion is right?” asked another guy. I didn’t answer.

Heckling the Egyptians

Having had my fill of the Salafists, I pushed further down the coast until I hit the Egyptian border.

A small village sits at the border, after which a sand dune runs up to a small Hamas base and coils of barbed wire marking the end of Gaza. An Israeli naval ship sat just offshore.

I stopped at the edge of the village, where there were local around me, rather than risk getting in trouble at the border.

After surveying the scene for a moment, though, I noticed that a Hamas soldier had emerged from his guard hut and was beckoning me up the dune.

Not one to say no to a man wielding a machine gun, I followed his orders, trudged up the dune, and took a seat in his shack.

The man asked me for identification. I showed him my driver’s license and an Egyptian press card. Seeing my wallet, he asked me to hand it to him. When I hesitated, he warned me that I was in a restricted area, seemingly forgetting that he had called me into that area.

He looked through everything in my wallet, counting my cash and checking out each card I had. You try explaining a MetroCard to a militant.

When it was all done, the man offered me tea. I was put off by him, though, and declined.

Then he turned to me with a mischievous grin.

“Do you want to see the Egyptians?” he asked.

I couldn’t bring myself to say no.

So we walked across the small base to the barbed wire fence. There, on the other side, about 10 meters away, stood an Egyptian grunt in desert fatigues and an oversized helmet.

“Do you ever talk to them?” I asked.

“Only a little bit,” Mr. Hamas replied. “They’re afraid to talk to us because they’ll have problems with their officer.”

Suddenly, the Hamas guy began calling over to the Egyptian. The soldier, looking slightly startled, glanced our way and then quickly snapped back to attention. Then the Hamas guy whistled. I could see the Egyptian soldier straining to catch a glimpse of his hecklers through the corner of his eyes.

The Hamas guy tried one final and unsuccessful time to get a rise out of the Egyptian. And then he gave up. The fun over, I quickly excused myself and retreated down the sand dune, trying in vain to think of reasons to stay in Gaza a few more days.