Aug 12, 2009

A Clear and Present Danger

Israel Hayom (p. 2) by Shlomo Cezana and Daniel Serioti

Egyptian security forces arrested last week an al-Qaida cell that had planned to
abduct Israelis on Rosh Hashanah in Sinai and smuggle them into Gaza. Israel was
brought up to date and Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu discussed the matter with
Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak this week thanking him for the successful arrest
the terrorists.
Despite the arrest of the cell, Israel remains extremely concerned about the
terrorist infrastructure in Sinai. According to recent intelligence, about a dozen
terrorist cells currently reside there and seek to harm Israelis who may come to
spend the Jewish holidays at tourist sites. The various cells belong to al-Qaida,
Hizbullah and Hamas and all include “familiar faces” of terrorists who are already
in place in Sinai, ready to receive munitions and who make use of local
collaborators. The goal of the cells is to kidnap Israelis and bring them to the
Gaza Strip so to upset the balance power in negotiations between Israel and the
Palestinians and also to focus international attention on the Gaza Strip.
Yesterday a senior official in the Egypt security establishment told Israel
Hayom that Egyptian military and security forces deployed in Sinai had recently
begun a wide-scale hunt for a terrorist cell that had entered the peninsula from
Gaza. According to the Egyptian source, the cell’s members are planning a large-
scale attack against Israeli civilians who spend the holidays in the northern part
of Sinai. Cairo has not yet officially reported on the hunt or the arrest of the
collaborators, due to fear of damaging tourism in the peninsula, however the
information was conveyed to the relevant officials in the Israeli security
establishment. According to the senior Egyptian official, information about the
cell was gathered by Egyptian intelligence.
From this intelligence it appears that the cell had been in Gaza in recent
weeks and there planned the details of their infiltration into Egypt as well as
their potential targets for attack. The official also said that last weekend
Egypt’s security forces had arrested ten Sinai Bedouins who admitted, in the
course of their interrogation, to have had assisted the cell in planning their
attacks. They conducted surveys of sites which attract Israeli visitors, made
lists of the security arrangements at these sites, and even purchased a vehicle
for the cell members which was to serve them in transporting them across the
peninsula and fleeing the attack site the moment after it took place. Those
arrested spoke of how they had placed various devices, weapons, and explosives in
hiding places. They even directed the interrogators to the hiding place near Al-
Arish.