Posted on 07/03/2003 1:18:55 PM PDT by yonif
[IMRA: This is one of a series of stories now being leaked by officers in the IDF out of concern that the politicians have lost control over the situation. ISS (Shabak) head Avi Dichter's highly unusual public remarks - remarks that clashed dramatically with the Sharon government's actions (he said that he was confident that security control in cities in the West Bank would not be transferred to the Palestinians before the PA proved that they were confiscating weapons and taking other measures against the terror infrastructure in the Gaza Strip - this when less than 24 hours later security control was transferred to the PA in Bethlehem. It should be understood that this is about as far as security officials will go in Israel. Over the entire course of Oslo, there were scores of security men who were certain that the policies Israeli governments were following in Oslo would lead to disaster, but none were willing to forego their paychecks.]
Israel Defense Forces officers have passed on a protest to the Egyptian military with regard to the numerous infiltration's of terrorists - mostly Palestinians - from Egypt into Israel over the past two years. The protest was voiced during the most recent periodic meeting between officers from the two armies.
In 2002, the IDF counted some 1,000 incidents of infiltrations across the border with Egypt - between the Rafah border post and Eilat. This year has seen a slight fall-off in the infiltrations.
Some 80 percent of the infiltrations have occurred in the northern section of the border, and most have been criminally motivated - drug and commodity smuggling, and women brought into the country for prostitution rackets. Nevertheless, some of the infiltrations have been security-related.
Since 2001, the IDF has reported six incidents in which terrorists have infiltrated across the border with Egypt for the purpose of carrying out attacks. For the most part, the infiltrators were apprehended close to the border fence following confrontations with IDF patrols.
In most of these incidents, the infiltrators turned out to be Palestinian residents of the Gaza Strip who were unable to carry out terror attacks inside the Green Line due to the perimeter fence around the Strip, and chose instead to cross over from Rafah into Egypt, head south and then attempt to reenter Israel across the Sinai and Negev border, which is less protected.
The last infiltration of this kind, in January, led to the death of an Israeli soldier in the Nitzana region. Two terrorists were shot and killed in the incident.
During the last security coordination meeting, the Egyptian officers spoke of their intentions to deploy an additional 200 policemen along the border with Israel. The IDF officers charged that this was not enough. Your problem, the IDF officers told their Egyptian counterparts, is not along the border with Israel. It begins at Cairo's airport and the Suez border crossings, they added.
According to the IDF officers, Egypt does not conduct sufficient security checks at these points, does not filter out individuals with ties to terror organizations, and does not prevent such individuals from approaching the border with Israel.
The defense establishment believes that pressure on Cairo from Washington will lead to an improvement in cooperation in this area.
You think?
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