Current time in Rafah, Palestine right now
It is 5:14 pm in Rafah, Palestine 🇵🇸 right now, on Thursday, November 5, 2026. The city keeps Asia/Gaza, which is EET at UTC+2, so Rafah is 2 hours ahead of UTC, where it is 3:14 pm. The sun rose in Rafah at 6:02 am and sets at 4:51 pm, which is 10 hours 49 minutes of daylight.
What time is it in Rafah right now?
The time in Rafah, Palestine is 5:14 pm, 17:14 on a 24 hour clock, on Thursday November 5, 2026. The reading above ticks from your own device against the Asia/Gaza rules, so it stays right through a clock change rather than drifting an hour out twice a year.
Rafah sits at 31.30 degrees north and 34.24 degrees east, in the subtropical belt and 3,480 km from the equator. Its clock is set to a zone whose nominal meridian is 30.0 degrees east, and the city itself is 4.2 degrees east of that line. Those 4.2 degrees are worth 16 minutes 58 seconds of sun time, which is most of why solar noon here lands at 11:27 am rather than on the stroke of twelve.
Rafah time zone and UTC offset
The IANA zone for Rafah, Palestine is Asia/Gaza. Right now it is running at UTC+2 and the abbreviation in force is EET. Rafah is on standard time at the moment, at UTC+2. It moves to UTC+3 for part of the year.
Daylight hours in Rafah today
The sun rose in Rafah at 6:02 am and sets at 4:51 pm, which is 10 hours 49 minutes of daylight. Solar noon, the instant the sun stands at its highest over Rafah, is at 11:27 am, which is 33 minutes before clock noon. The sun's declination today is -15.73 degrees, so at this latitude it reaches about 43.0 degrees above the horizon at its highest, to the south.
| Reading | Time in Rafah |
|---|---|
| Sunrise | 6:02 am |
| Sunset | 4:51 pm |
| Solar noon | 11:27 am |
| Day length | 10 hours 49 minutes |
| Evening golden hour | 4:17 pm to 5:07 pm |
| Civil twilight ends | 5:16 pm |
The full month by month picture for this city, the extremes of the year and every twilight band are on the sunrise and sunset page for Rafah, which works from the same coordinates.
Where Rafah is on the map
The marker sits at the coordinates this whole page is computed from, so the sun times, the distances and the solar noon above all belong to this exact point rather than to the wider metropolitan area.
An interactive map of Rafah. It loads when you scroll to it, so it costs nothing to the rest of the page. Open Rafah on OpenStreetMap instead if you prefer.
Time difference between Rafah and major cities
Every row below is computed at this instant, so daylight saving on either side is already in it. A positive figure means that city's clock reads later than Rafah.
| City | Local time | Gap | Relative to Rafah |
|---|---|---|---|
| Los Angeles, California | 7:14 am | -10 | 10 hours behind of Rafah |
| Chicago, Illinois | 9:14 am | -8 | 8 hours behind of Rafah |
| New York, New York | 10:14 am | -7 | 7 hours behind of Rafah |
| Toronto, Canada | 10:14 am | -7 | 7 hours behind of Rafah |
| Sao Paulo, Brazil | 12:14 pm | -5 | 5 hours behind of Rafah |
| London, United Kingdom | 3:14 pm | -2 | 2 hours behind of Rafah |
| Paris, France | 4:14 pm | -1 | 1 hour behind of Rafah |
| Berlin, Germany | 4:14 pm | -1 | 1 hour behind of Rafah |
| Johannesburg, South Africa | 5:14 pm | 0 | same time as Rafah |
| Moscow, Russia | 6:14 pm | +1 | 1 hour ahead of Rafah |
| Dubai, United Arab Emirates | 7:14 pm | +2 | 2 hours ahead of Rafah |
| Delhi, India | 8:44 pm | +3:30 | 3 hours 30 minutes ahead of Rafah |
| Singapore, Singapore | 11:14 pm | +6 | 6 hours ahead of Rafah |
| Hong Kong, China | 11:14 pm | +6 | 6 hours ahead of Rafah |
| Tokyo, Japan | 12:14 am | +7 | 7 hours ahead of Rafah |
| Sydney, Australia | 2:14 am | +9 | 9 hours ahead of Rafah |
Best time to call Rafah
Treating a working day as 9am to 6pm on both sides, this is the window the two cities genuinely share. Some of these pairs have no shared working hour at all, which is worth knowing before a meeting is proposed.
| Calling from | Gap | Window in Rafah | Their local time |
|---|---|---|---|
| New York | -7 | 4:00 pm to 6:00 pm | 9:00 am to 11:00 am |
| Los Angeles | -10 | no shared hour | no shared hour |
| London | -2 | 11:00 am to 6:00 pm | 9:00 am to 4:00 pm |
| Delhi | +3:30 | 9:00 am to 2:30 pm | 12:30 pm to 6:00 pm |
| Sydney | +9 | no shared hour | no shared hour |
Other cities in Palestine
We cover 7 cities in Palestine. These are the ones nearest to Rafah, with the time on their clocks right now.
| City | Region | Local time | Offset |
|---|---|---|---|
| Khan Yunis | Gaza Strip | 5:14 pm | UTC+2 |
| Gaza | Gaza Strip | 5:14 pm | UTC+2 |
| Jabalya | Gaza Strip | 5:14 pm | UTC+2 |
| Hebron | West Bank | 5:14 pm | UTC+2 |
| East Jerusalem | West Bank | 5:14 pm | UTC+2 |
| Nablus | West Bank | 5:14 pm | UTC+2 |
Cities on Asia/Gaza time
4 of our cities keep Asia/Gaza, so every one of them reads 5:14 pm at this moment and changes its clocks on the same night as Rafah. Nearest first:
| City | Local time | From Rafah |
|---|---|---|
| Khan Yunis, Palestine | 5:14 pm | 8 km |
| Gaza, Palestine | 5:14 pm | 31 km |
| Jabalya, Palestine | 5:14 pm | 34 km |
Moon phase over Rafah tonight
The moon is a waning crescent tonight, 26.0 days into its cycle and about 14% lit. The next full moon falls on November 24, 2026 at 4:53 pm Gaza time, and the next new moon on November 9, 2026 at 9:01 am. Both are the same instant everywhere on Earth, printed here on the Rafah clock, which is why the calendar date can differ from the one a reader further east or west sees.
When the clocks change in Rafah
The next change is on Saturday, March 27, 2027, 141 days from now, when the clocks in Rafah go forward 1 hour at 1:59 am and the offset moves from UTC+2 to UTC+3.
Two things follow from that. Any standing call with Rafah shifts by an hour on that date unless the other side moves the same weekend, and every offset printed on this page is the offset for today rather than a fixed property of the city.
How far Rafah is from other cities
Great-circle distance, computed from the coordinates rather than road mileage. The nearest city we cover to Rafah is Khan Yunis, Palestine at 8 km, and the furthest is Tauranga, New Zealand at 16,479 km, which is 82% of the way to being exactly opposite.
| City | km | miles | Direction | Their time |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Khan Yunis, Palestine | 8 | 5 | north east | 5:14 pm |
| Gaza, Palestine | 31 | 19 | north east | 5:14 pm |
| Jabalya, Palestine | 34 | 21 | north east | 5:14 pm |
| Arish, Egypt | 46 | 29 | south west | 5:14 pm |
| Ashkelon, Israel | 52 | 32 | north east | 5:14 pm |
| Beersheba, Israel | 52 | 32 | east | 5:14 pm |
| Ashdod, Israel | 67 | 42 | north east | 5:14 pm |
| Hebron, Palestine | 85 | 53 | east | 5:14 pm |
| Rehovot, Israel | 85 | 53 | north east | 5:14 pm |
| Bet Shemesh, Israel | 86 | 53 | north east | 5:14 pm |
The antipode of Rafah
Dig straight through the centre of the Earth from Rafah, Palestine and you come out at 31.30 degrees south, 145.76 degrees west. That point is in the South Pacific Ocean. The nearest city in our catalogue to it is Tauranga, New Zealand, 3,536 km away from the antipode itself, where the clock currently reads 4:14 am on Friday.
The antipode is worked out by flipping the latitude across the equator and swinging the longitude a half turn: 31.30 degrees north becomes 31.30 degrees south, and 34.24 degrees east becomes 145.76 degrees west. Two thirds of the planet is ocean and the land is unevenly spread, so most antipodes are open water: Rafah is no exception. The local time at the antipode runs close to UTC-10, roughly twelve hours from Rafah, because a half turn of longitude is a half turn of the day.
Sunrise and sunset in Rafah
Today the sun rises in Rafah at 6:02 am and sets at 4:51 pm, giving 10 hours 49 minutes of daylight. The dedicated page for this city carries the month by month table, the longest and shortest days of 2026, the golden and blue hour bands at both ends of the day, and all three twilight stages: sunrise and sunset times in Rafah.
Sun and moon in Rafah today
The sun is up in Rafah for 10 hours 49 minutes today, from 6:02 am to 4:51 pm. The moon rises in Rafah at 2:11 am and sets at 2:30 pm. The next phase is the new moon on November 9, 2026. It is 15% lit at the moment, a waning crescent, thinning by about 7.6 percentage points a day.
| Sun | Time in Rafah |
|---|---|
| Astronomical dawn | 4:39 am |
| Nautical dawn | 5:08 am |
| Civil dawn | 5:36 am |
| Sunrise | 6:02 am |
| Solar noon | 11:27 am |
| Sunset | 4:51 pm |
| Civil dusk | 5:16 pm |
| Nautical dusk | 5:45 pm |
| Astronomical dusk | 6:14 pm |
Twilight is graded by how far the sun has dropped below the horizon. Civil twilight ends six degrees down, which is roughly the point at which you need a light to read outside. Nautical twilight ends at twelve degrees, when the horizon at sea stops being usable for a sextant sight. Astronomical twilight ends at eighteen degrees, which is full darkness for an observer.
| Light band | Time in Rafah | Length |
|---|---|---|
| Morning blue hour | 5:36 am to 5:46 am | 0h 10m |
| Morning golden hour | 5:46 am to 6:36 am | 0h 50m |
| Evening golden hour | 4:17 pm to 5:07 pm | 0h 50m |
| Evening blue hour | 5:07 pm to 5:16 pm | 0h 10m |
Golden hour is the stretch with the sun between six degrees above the horizon and four below it, and blue hour runs from there down to six degrees below. Neither is literally an hour: each is as long as the sun takes to cross those few degrees, which is minutes near the equator and can be most of the evening at high latitude.
| Moon | Reading in Rafah |
|---|---|
| Moonrise | 2:11 am |
| Moonset | 2:30 pm |
| Phase | waning crescent, waning |
| Illumination | 15% of the disc lit |
| Moon age | 25.8 days since the new moon |
| Distance | 385,000 km |
Moonrise and moonset are computed to the moment the moon's upper edge touches a flat horizon, allowing for refraction, for the size of the disc and for the moon's parallax, which together put the centre of the moon at 0.125 degrees above the horizon at the instant it rises. That is a different horizon from the one sunrise uses, and it is why a moonrise time cannot be worked out with a sunrise formula.
Meeting planner: Rafah and four other places
Every hour of Thursday, November 5, 2026 in Rafah, Palestine, read across 4 other places. Columns are Rafah local hours. A shaded cell is an hour inside 9 to 5 there, and a solid one is an hour inside 9 to 5 everywhere in the grid.
Change the places or the date
| Rafah local hour | 0 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| RafahEET UTC+2 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 |
| Los AngelesPST UTC-8 | 14-1 | 15-1 | 16-1 | 17-1 | 18-1 | 19-1 | 20-1 | 21-1 | 22-1 | 23-1 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 |
| New YorkEST UTC-5 | 17-1 | 18-1 | 19-1 | 20-1 | 21-1 | 22-1 | 23-1 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 |
| LondonGMT UTC+0 | 22-1 | 23-1 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 |
| DelhiIST UTC+5:30 | 3:30 | 4:30 | 5:30 | 6:30 | 7:30 | 8:30 | 9:30 | 10:30 | 11:30 | 12:30 | 13:30 | 14:30 | 15:30 | 16:30 | 17:30 | 18:30 | 19:30 | 20:30 | 21:30 | 22:30 | 23:30 | 0:30+1 | 1:30+1 | 2:30+1 |
No hour on Thursday, November 5, 2026 is inside 9 to 5 in all 5 places, so nothing is highlighted as a shared working hour. Los Angeles and Delhi are 13 hours 30 minutes apart, which is more than the eight hour working day leaves room for. The closest is 3 of 5: from 11:00 am in Rafah it is working hours in Rafah, London and Delhi, but outside them in Los Angeles and New York. A meeting across this set has to be early or late for somebody.
Prayer times in Rafah
Seven days from November 5, 2026, computed for Rafah, Palestine at 31.30 degrees north, 34.24 degrees east, on the clock of Asia/Gaza. The method is Muslim World League (Muslim World League, Mecca), which puts Fajr at 18.0 degrees below the horizon and Isha at 17.0 degrees. Asr uses the Standard shadow ratio of 1, which is the Shafi'i, Maliki and Hanbali position.
| Date | Fajr | Sunrise | Dhuhr | Asr | Maghrib | Isha |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Thursday November 5 | 4:39 am | 6:02 am | 11:27 am | 2:29 pm | 4:51 pm | 6:09 pm |
| Friday November 6 | 4:40 am | 6:03 am | 11:27 am | 2:28 pm | 4:50 pm | 6:08 pm |
| Saturday November 7 | 4:41 am | 6:03 am | 11:27 am | 2:28 pm | 4:50 pm | 6:08 pm |
| Sunday November 8 | 4:41 am | 6:04 am | 11:27 am | 2:27 pm | 4:49 pm | 6:07 pm |
| Monday November 9 | 4:42 am | 6:05 am | 11:27 am | 2:27 pm | 4:48 pm | 6:06 pm |
| Tuesday November 10 | 4:43 am | 6:06 am | 11:27 am | 2:26 pm | 4:48 pm | 6:06 pm |
| Wednesday November 11 | 4:43 am | 6:07 am | 11:27 am | 2:26 pm | 4:47 pm | 6:05 pm |
Dhuhr is solar noon at Rafah, Palestine, the instant the Sun crosses the local meridian, so it moves with longitude inside the time zone and with the equation of time through the year rather than sitting at a fixed clock reading. Sunrise and Maghrib are the standard refracted horizon, the same 0.833 degrees every almanac uses. Every figure above is computed from the Sun's position for this exact coordinate; none of it is copied from a table.
Different methods disagree, and that is expected rather than an error. Fajr under ISNA at 15 degrees comes later than Fajr under Egyptian General Authority of Survey at 19.5 degrees, by twenty minutes or more depending on latitude and season. Follow whichever your local mosque follows.
Qibla direction from Rafah
From Rafah, Palestine the qibla is 151.8 degrees on a true compass, which is south-southeast, or 28.2 degrees west of due south. The Kaaba is 1,230 km away, 764 miles, measured over the surface of the Earth.
That figure is the initial bearing of the great circle from Rafah, Palestine to 21.4225 degrees north, 39.8262 degrees east, which is the Kaaba inside Masjid al-Haram.
The bearing is measured from true north, not magnetic north. A magnetic compass points at the magnetic pole, and the difference between the two can be anything from nothing to more than twenty degrees depending where you are, so check your compass reading against magnetic declination for Rafah, Palestine before you use it. A phone compass set to true north, or the shadow of a vertical stick at local solar noon, avoids the problem entirely.
Put a Rafah clock on your site
A live clock showing the current time in Rafah, Palestine, ready to paste into any page that accepts HTML. It reads Asia/Gaza from the time zone database, so it stays right when Rafah changes its clocks, and it shows EET to every visitor wherever they are reading from. It is a plain iframe: no account, no script to install, nothing to pay.
The box needs 183 pixels of height for these settings, which is what the code above sets, and the numbers show at full size from 305 pixels of width up. Narrower than that they scale down rather than wrapping, and turning a line off makes the box shorter. The code updates with either.
Rafah time now: common questions
- What time is it in Rafah, Palestine right now?
- 5:14 pm on Thursday November 5, 2026. Rafah runs on EET, UTC+2.
- What time zone is Rafah in?
- Asia/Gaza, currently EET at UTC+2. 4 of the cities on this site keep that zone.
- What is the UTC offset for Rafah?
- UTC+2 at this instant. It alternates between UTC+2 and UTC+3 across the year.
- Does Rafah observe daylight saving time?
- Yes. The next change is March 27, 2027, when the clocks go forward.
- How many hours ahead or behind is Rafah of New York?
- Rafah is 7 hours ahead of New York, where it is 10:14 am right now.
- What time does the sun set in Rafah today?
- 4:51 pm, after a sunrise at 6:02 am and 10 hours 49 minutes of daylight.
- What is on the exact opposite side of the Earth from Rafah?
- 31.30 degrees south, 145.76 degrees west, in the South Pacific Ocean.
- When is the best time to call Rafah from London?
- Between 11:00 am and 6:00 pm in Rafah, which is 9:00 am to 4:00 pm in London.
Nearby city clocks
All cities · Timezone converter · Sunrise and sunset · Moon phases