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Egypt: Israel’s Alleged ‘Peace Partner’
Egyptian trucks carrying humanitarian aid make their way to the Gaza Strip, amid the ongoing conflict in Gaza between Israel and Hamas, at the Kerem Shalom crossing in southern Israel, May 30, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Amir Cohen
In capturing Rafah between the Gaza Strip and Egypt, Israel uncovered more than 50 smuggling tunnels — some large enough to drive trucks through. Big trucks.
Israel has said that it will continue to control the Philadelphi Corridor to ensure that Hamas cannot rearm itself. Egypt, a ceasefire negotiating “partner,” announced that it will not accept Israeli control. And, in fact, The New York Times reported that Egypt’s state-run Al-Qahera News quoted an unnamed senior official saying “there is no truth” to claims of Hamas tunnels under the border.
Sadly, there’s nothing new here.
Egypt proved long before October 7 that it is not a “peace partner” for Israel and not a cooperative country. During the 1978 Camp David negotiations, Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin wanted to return Gaza to Egypt along with Sinai. President Anwar Sadat was clear: Either Israel would keep Gaza and there would be a treaty, or Israel would try to return Gaza and there would be no treaty.
The Israeli leader made the decision to take Egypt out of the circle of war.
Sadat’s position was apiece with the Arab countries still at war. They had decided in 1949 that they would do nothing to help Arab refugees from what became Israel — that, they said, was Israel’s problem to solve. They put them Palestinians in refugee camps in Arab countries, closed the gates, and restricted their options. Gaza was a duty-free port for the Egyptian military; Palestinians were not able to live in Egypt proper, and the life and economic statistics were horrible.
UNRWA was actually created to settle the Arab refugees in Arab countries, the same way that international organizations settled refugees of the Korean War in Korea, and tens of millions of other refugees were resettled after World War II. The Arab states simply said no. [Read Adi Schwartz and Einat Wilf’s excellent The War of Return for details.]
Israel’s withdrawal from Sinai in 1982 reestablished a border between Gaza and Egypt — the Philadelphi Route — which divided the city of Rafah. (If you think the tunnels of Rafah were built by Hamas, you’re way late.) The 2005 Gaza disengagement was accompanied by the Philadelphi Agreement, under which Israel and Egypt pledged to work together to “stem terrorism, arms smuggling, and other illegal cross-border activities.” Israel was supposed to have access to the goods brought in by the Palestinian Authority (PA), which was, for a while, the government of Gaza.
Jordan was a bit different, but not much. It illegally annexed the West Bank and the eastern side of Jerusalem in 1950, giving citizenship to some resident Arabs, including some refugees. In 1972, the PLO tried to overthrow the King of Jordan; Israel stepped in to prevent Syria from taking advantage, but King Hussein knew the Hashemite Kingdom had no long-term future in the territory. In 1988, he renounced Jordan’s claim and stripped most of the people of Jordanian citizenship. No one seemed to have noticed.
Over the years, King Hussein not-quite-jokingly referred to Yitzhak Rabin as “Jordan’s Defense Minister for the West Bank.” [His heir, King Abdullah II, relies on Israel for economic assistance as well as security control.] Then, in 1994, he had the same discussion with Yitzhak Rabin in advance of the Jordan-Israel peace treaty that Sadat had with Menachem Begin: keep the West Bank and have a treaty, or push it on us and there won’t be one.
It was still going to be Israel’s problem to solve.
Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza has exposed some serious shortcomings by Israel in the security of the Gaza Strip. Those will, no doubt, be the subject of a serious post-war assessment. But consider Egypt, Israel’s alleged peace partner and recipient of billions in US aid.
The Egyptian government refused to permit Palestinians displaced by the war to enter northern Sinai, even temporarily. Cairo claimed it would not be secure — although the mostly-empty area would easily hold Egyptian military camps for temporary refuge. Even NPR was critical of the decision.
The world later discovered that Gazans could buy their way out, though, for several thousand dollars, which tells you something about Egypt’s motives.
Egypt also delayed passage of aid trucks into Gaza after Israel took over the crossing, demanding a Palestinian presence restored on the Gaza side of the border.
After a (rare) rebuke by the US, Egypt agreed to reopen the crossing, but after another slowdown, Middle East Monitor reports that talks with the US and Israel in July failed to resolve the new impasse.
A week ago, an Israel-Egypt border agreement for Gaza was announced.
On Monday, Egypt reneged.
Israel will have to make the determination that serves its security interests. It would be in the interest of the United States and the Palestinian people to support a strong Israeli presence and control of the border to help break the control of the territory and the people of Gaza by Hamas.
Shoshana Bryen is Senior Director of The Jewish Policy Center and Editor of inFOCUS Quarterly
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Indigo wants the law to block an online boycott promotion that appropriates bookstore branding
Canadian bookstore chain Indigo is seeking a court injunction ordering internet service providers to block a website that the company says causes the brand “irreparable harm,” while also infringing on its copyright and trademark. Indigo’s lawyers appeared in a virtual Federal Court hearing Sept. 17 to ask a judge for an injunction that would order […]
The post Indigo wants the law to block an online boycott promotion that appropriates bookstore branding appeared first on The Canadian Jewish News.
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‘F—king Jews’: Protester Interrupts Hate Crimes Hearing at US Capitol Over Focus on Antisemitism
US Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) speaking at a press conference about the United States restricting weapons for Israel, at the US Capitol, Washington, DC. Photo: Michael Brochstein/Sipa USA via Reuters Connect
An anti-Israel agitator on Tuesday unleashed an antisemitic tirade during a congressional hearing in Washington, DC on rising hate crimes across the United States.
The US Senate Judiciary Committee held a hearing to address growing numbers of attacks against minority religious and ethnic groups in the United States. While Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) delivered a presentation condemning anti-Israel protests on college campuses, an angry demonstrator stood up and hurled expletives targeted at the Jewish community.
“F—king Jews and the Israelis themselves!” the man shouted, apparently frustrated and angry at Cruz for focusing on the deluge of reported antisemitic attacks following Hamas’s Oct. 7 massacre across southern Israel.
“Talk about the 40,000 [casualties in Gaza]. Talk about all these people. Why is [this presentation] about antisemitism? F—k the law,” the agitator said before being escorted out by Capitol Police.
“We now have a demonstration of antisemitism. We have a demonstration of the hate,” Cruz responded.
Cruz then slammed Democrats for exhibiting what he described as weakness on antisemitism and vowed to punish antisemites if Republicans secure a Senate majority and the presidency in November. He accused the Biden administration and the US Justice Department of turning a “blind eye” to antisemitism.
“I’ll tell you this. Next year, if there’s a Republican majority on this committee, you will see real leadership. Next year, if there’s a Republican administration, you will see people prosecuted for this sort of violence,” Cruz said.
Senate Republicans criticized Democrats for insisting on broadening the scope of the hearing from antisemitism to a “generic” discussion about all forms of bigotry. Some critics pointed out that Democrats previously condemned use of the phrase “All Lives Matter” in lieu of “Black Lives Matter,” accusing conservatives of attempting to minimize anti-black racism.
Earlier in the hearing, US Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL), chair of the Judiciary Committee, defended shifting the focus of the meeting off antisemitism specifically, stating that “prioritizing which group is being discriminated against the worst” is not a “valid exercise of [the committee’s] authority.” He went on to argue that hatred is a problem “that extends beyond the Jewish population” and also affects “the Arab population” and “the Palestinian population.”
Progressive lawmakers have been under fire from pro-Israel voices in the months following the Hamas atrocities of Oct. 7 for allegedly being too soft on Hamas and placing unrealistic restrictions on Israel’s war effort in Gaza. Recent polling suggests that large swaths of Democratic voters have soured on Israel, with many supporting the implementation of an arms embargo on the Jewish state. Younger Democrats, in particular, are reporting significantly greater sympathy for Palestinians than the citizens of Israel. Many Democratic staffers have also reportedly revolted against party officials, demanding that they adopt a more adversarial posture against Israel.
In response, Democratic elected officials have sharpened their rhetoric against the Jewish state, with some suggesting that Israel has committed a “genocide” in Gaza. Democratic politicians have also sought to pressure US President Joe Biden to withhold certain weapons from Israel.
Tuesday’s hearing came amid a record surge in antisemitism across the US since Oct. 7.
The post ‘F—king Jews’: Protester Interrupts Hate Crimes Hearing at US Capitol Over Focus on Antisemitism first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Israeli Cyber Expert: Explosives Planted in Hezbollah Pagers in Op Planned Months Before War
An ambulance arrives at a hospital as thousands of people, mainly Hezbollah fighters, were wounded on Sept. 17, 2024 when the pagers they use to communicate exploded across Lebanon. Photo: REUTERS/Mohamed Azakir
An Israeli cyber and national security expert has claimed that the exploding pagers carried by Hezbollah members in Lebanon, which left thousands wounded and killed at least nine people on Tuesday, were part of a sophisticated attack that was planned at least half a year before the war in Gaza erupted.
Dr. Eyal Pinko, a former navy commander and senior research fellow at the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies, dismissed theories that the blasts were caused by lithium batteries that were hacked to become overheated, and said that the nature of the wounds seen in footage emerging from Lebanon was consistent with those caused by explosives such as TNT and HTB.
“To get this kind of wound you need to have between one to two grams of type of explosives, which is not a big technological issue — you just need to open the beeper,” Pinko said during a briefing with reporters on Tuesday evening. He added that a stable explosive that wouldn’t detonate accidentally would have been inserted into the device, along with a small control mechanism capable of receiving remote commands via a call or page.
Such an operation would have required significant infiltration of Hezbollah’s communication systems, according to Pinko, and planting explosives in pagers would necessitate a serious breach of the supply chain. “This is an intelligence operation that was very well planned, prepared for more than one and a half years,” Pinko said
Pinko alluded to the possibility of a coordinated effort, suggesting that Israel may not have acted alone if it was behind the attack in Lebanon, where Hezbollah wields significant political and military clout. He noted efforts by Germany, France, the US, and the UK to prevent escalation in the region.
Israel has so far been quiet about the explosions, but senior Lebanese officials have blame the Jewish state. So too has Hezbollah, which said Israel would receive “its fair punishment.”
The operation clearly appeared to serve as a message to Hezbollah, showcasing vulnerabilities in its security apparatus and serving as a form of deterrence, Pinko said. “It’s saying that, ‘you’re already being penetrated. We know where you are and what you do. Now look what we can do: In one single shot, in less than a second, we can eliminate almost 3,000 terror operatives.’”
Meanwhile, Sky News Arabia quoted an Israeli military source as saying that Hezbollah’s supply chain was infiltrated with the Mossad, Israel’s intelligence agency, placing PETN, a highly explosive stable material, on the batteries of the devices.
A source close to Hezbollah, speaking on condition of anonymity, told AFP that the pagers were “sabotaged at the source” before being imported by Hezbollah, an Iran-backed terrorist organization based in Lebanon.
Al Jazeera said that the pagers had been in use by Hezbollah operatives for five months.
Brigadier General (res) Amir Avivi, founder of the Israel Defense and Security Forum (IDSF), told The Algemeiner that the attack “had the Mossad’s fingerprints all over it.”
“Hezbollah certainly got the message,” Avivi said, adding that war between Israel and the Iran-backed terror group was “imminent.”
However, Pinko said that Tuesday’s coordinated attacks were not a prelude to a full ground invasion into Lebanon and that Israel was likely to adopt a “wait and see” approach. “Israel doesn’t want to go towards further escalation; not in the north, and not with the Houthis in Yemen. They just want to finish the business in Gaza.”
The explosions came hours after a revelation by the Israeli Shin Bet security agency that a Hezbollah cell had infiltrated Israel with the intent to assassinate a former senior defense official in Tel Aviv using a mobile phone, camera, and remote detonation.
Hezbollah has fired barrages of rockets, missiles, and drones at northern Israel almost daily following the Oct. 7 attacks by Hamas-led Palestinian terrorists on the Jewish state’s southern region. Since then, both sides have been exchanging fire constantly while avoiding a major escalation as war rages in Gaza to the south.
About 80,000 Israelis have been forced to evacuate their homes in northern Israel and flee to other parts of the country amid the unrelenting attacks from Hezbollah.
Israeli leaders have said they seek a diplomatic resolution to the conflict with Hezbollah along the border with Lebanon but are prepared to use large-scale military force if needed to ensure all citizens can safely return to their homes.
On Monday night, Israel’s security cabinet expanded its war goals to include returning the displaced Israelis from the north.
The post Israeli Cyber Expert: Explosives Planted in Hezbollah Pagers in Op Planned Months Before War first appeared on Algemeiner.com.