Egyptian FM: IDF attack on Gaza border would not be tolerated
By Haaretz Service and News Agencies
Egypt's foreign minister said in remarks published Wednesday that his government would not allow Israel to bomb areas along the Egypt-Gaza border where Palestinian militants are believed to be smuggling weapons.
Ahmed Aboul Gheit told the London-based Asharq Al-Awsat newspaper that any Israel Defense Forces bombing in the Philadelphia Route would violate international treaties.
"If this were to happen, it would be considered a breach of all the Palestinian-Israeli agreements. It is not possible that we would accept that or let it pass as if nothing happened," he was quoted as saying.
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Aboul Gheit also denied Egypt was responsible for any cross-border smuggling.
On Tuesday, Aboul Gheit told reporters in Cairo that Egypt could handle security on the Egypt-Gaza border. He proposed building surveillance towers and sending more Egyptian patrols to the border area.
"Egypt's border with Gaza is a matter of sovereignty between Egypt and the Palestinians," he said.
As tensions mounted Wednesday in the Gaza Strip, top Egyptian and U.S. intelligence officials met to work out possible solutions for policing the border between Gaza and Egypt, officials and diplomats said.
Egyptian officials said Egypt turned down American proposals to station international forces led by the U.S. along the border, but promised to boost their own efforts to monitor the border and crack down on traffickers.
"This [proposal] is not accepted by the government, nor by public opinion," said one Egyptian official who is involved in the border security operation.
U.S. National Intelligence Director John Negroponte concluded talks Wednesday with his Egyptian counterpart, Omar Suleiman, who has also been working on a deal to coax the Palestinian radical group to moderate its policies and join Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas' peace efforts.
Egyptian officials said Negroponte and Suleiman reviewed "bilateral security cooperation." U.S. Embassy officials declined to comment on Negroponte's visit.
But Arab diplomats said Negroponte proposed to Suleiman that Egypt allow a U.S.-led team of multinational peace monitors help police the porous border with Gaza.
He also proposed that CIA counterterrorism experts assist in efforts to halt cross-border smuggling and combat terrorism in the Sinai peninsula, which has been the scene of several attacks on tourists in the last three years, said the diplomats.
Last year U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice brokered a security agreement that allowed Israel Defense Forces troops to withdraw from the border area after 38 years of Israeli control.
Following the withdrawal, Egypt sent some 750 of its security forces to boost the small contingent of police in the area.
On Sunday, Egypt's official media reported that some 5,000 police forces were dispatched to the border following reports that Israeli aircraft might bomb the area in a bid to destroy tunnels used to smuggle weapons.
Both Israel and Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak denied the reports.
Under their 1979 peace agreement, Egypt is allowed only a small number of police forces in areas close to the border with Israel.
The Multinational Force and Observers in Sinai comprises 1,800
troops from 11 nations, including the United States, Canada, several European states, Australia and New Zealand.
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