April 16, 2008
by Dani Reshef
According to ISRAELI intelligence sources a large scale tunnel system between Gaza and EGYPT was providing, in the last months, the Hamas with heavy, dangerous and sophisticated weapon systems. Anti-tank and surface-to- air missiles, mortars, large amounts of munitions and long range Katiusha rockets were smuggled from Iran and Sudan. They passed through Egypt and into Gaza by way of many dozens of tunnels which are connecting Gaza with EGYPT.

The weapons smuggling to Gaza was on such a scale that could not be unnoticed on the EGYPTIAN side.  The problem is not just on the border with Gaza - the large smuggling apparatus stretches all over the Sinai Peninsula, by thousands of Bedouin tribesmen and is well known and monitored by the EGYPTIAN security service. (See - RAFAH CROSSING )

There is a saying that if you go to bed with a snake don’t be surprised if you are bitten by the snake.  

On 01/22/2008, thousands of women protested and breached the EGYPTIAN blockade in Rafah crossing. EGYPTIAN police eventually responded with live ammunition which killed a woman and wounded other 70 Palestinian women. A few hours later HAMAS engineers blew up large loopholes in the wall dividing Gaza Strip from EGYPT and Northern Sinai was flooded with half a million Palestinians. Among the hundreds of thousands of Palestinians there were also hundreds of terrorists, who entered Sinai to re-cross the border to Israel in order to commit terror attacks. Others targeted the tourist resorts looking for potential ISRAELI targets, which is a major source of income to the EGYPTIAN economy.  EGYPT found out that Gaza is not only a threat to Israel but, eventually, a threat to their own country.

EGYPT also discovered that there is a mutual inspiration between the HAMAS, which was founded as a branch of the Muslims Brotherhood in EGYPT, and the Islamic movement in EGYPT. EGYPT now faces a HAMAS terror threat in Sinai combined with increasing Islamic opposition inside EGYPT.

The EGYPTIANS responded in:

A. cracking down on the Muslims Brotherhood in EGYPT, and indeed, sentenced yesterday, 04/15/2008, in a mass trial, 25 of their senior activists to few years in jail, among them Khayrat al-Shater, no’ 3 in the organization (See - Arrest 04.05.08 ).

 B. EGYPT built a “Berlin wall” along the 16 km of border with Gaza with machine-gun positions each 100 meters in order to contain and isolate the threat from Gaza and prevent, as much as possible, any association between HAMAS in Gaza and the Muslims Brotherhood in EGYPT.

Today the HAMAS in Gaza is besieged even more than before the breaching of Rafah crossing on 01/22/2008. The EGYPTIAN authority no longer overlooks the massive arms smuggling.

The tactical achievement in breaching the border with EGYPT turned to be a strategic disaster for HAMAS. EGYPT and the HAMAS regime in Gaza are no longer cooperating in enabling terror against Israel but are on a collision course. Hamas is directly threatening Egypt to use power in order “to break the siege”, as the HAMAS put it. EGYPT reinforced its troops on the border with Gaza and ordered its soldiers to use live ammunition and shoot to kill if there will be a Palestinian attempt to cross the border.
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SOURCE: Global Jihad

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