Cairo Excuses Israeli Attacks

Antiwar.com published this article

محمد صادق في السبت ٢٤ - يناير - ٢٠٠٩ ١٢:٠٠ صباحاً

ered considerable damage from the effects of nearby bombardments. 
"The Israelis frequently hit the Palestinian side of Rafah with earth-penetrating munitions, causing houses to collapse and windows to break on the Egyptian side," said al-Bulk, a resident of al-Arish, located 40 kilometres west of the border. "Most of Egyptian Rafah still has no electricity at night because of damage to the electricity grid on the Palestinian side. 
"Some of the agricultural land close to the border, mostly olive and apple groves, has also been damaged by the effects of nearby air strikes, and local farmers have been unable to tend their crops," al-Bulk added. 
He went on to say that most inhabitants of Egyptian Rafah, particularly those in neighborhoods adjacent to the border, had since left for safer locations. "The city has become a ghost town because so many residents have left for al-Arish and other towns in Sinai." 
On Jan. 11, several people in Egyptian Rafah were injured by flying shrapnel from Israeli air strikes on the Palestinian side of the city. "Two officers and two children were injured by shrapnel as a result of continuous Israeli attacks on the border area with the Gaza Strip," state daily al-Gomhouriya reported the following day. 
On Jan. 12, Israeli Ambassador to Egypt Shalom Cohen reportedly tendered an official apology for the incident to the Egyptian Foreign Ministry. Foreign Ministry spokesman Hossam Zaki subsequently told reporters that Egypt had accepted the apology, which he called "very significant". 
 
Critics of government policy decried the weak official response to Israeli violations of Egyptian territory, in contrast to Egypt's tough stance vis-à-vis perceived Palestinian transgressors. 
"When an Egyptian officer was killed near the border in an exchange of gunfire with Palestinians (on Dec. 28), the state media played up the issue and accused Hamas of targeting Egyptians," Ibrahim Mansour, political analyst and managing editor-in-chief of al-Dustour told IPS. "Yet when Israeli air strikes injure Egyptian officers and children, a simple apology from the ambassador suffices." 
Hamdi Hassan, MP for the Muslim Brotherhood, Egypt's largest opposition movement, drew a similarly unflattering comparison. 
"Last year, the foreign minister told Gazans that they would have their legs broken if they tried to cross the border into Egypt without permission," Hassan told IPS. "But he holds his tongue when Egyptians are hurt by Israeli air strikes." 
Sources close to the border also say that Egyptian airspace was violated on numerous occasions by Israeli fighter jets over the course of the three-week-long war on Gaza. "Israeli jets entered Egyptian airspace on an almost daily basis," said al-Bulk. 
On Jan. 12, independent daily al-Masri al-Youm cited local eyewitnesses as saying that Israeli fighter jets "regularly flew over Egyptian airspace while staging attacks on the border region." 
According to Mansour, "striking targets on the Egyptian border is in violation of all the laws and norms stipulated in the Camp David agreement (signed between Israel and Egypt in 1979), which expressly forbids either side from staging military flights on or near the border area." 
Here, too, Hassan blasted the government's seeming indifference towards reported violations of Egyptian airspace. 
"Israel has frequently violated Egyptian airspace in order to hit targets on the Palestinian side without eliciting any official reaction from Cairo," said Hassan. "The regime must be held accountable for its craven and complicit attitude."

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