Sudan Reporter: Local Communications Severed Prior to Arms Factory Blast

The telecommunications network in the Sudanese capital of Khartoum were disconnected for about an hour before an explosion rocked an arms factory there a local journalist told Haaretz on Thursday.

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The blackout meant that aside from the sound of gunshots, residents of the area had no idea what was going on, said the journalist. The explosion lit up the sky, and nobody knew at first what was going, he added. Eyewitnesses later described hearing planes flying in the sky around the time of the blast.

Residents of the area know that the factory is used for producing and storing weapons, said the journalist. Large parts of the factory were destroyed in the blast, he said.

Four military planes attacked the Yarmouk arms factory overnight between Tuesday and Wednesday, causing a mass fire. After many hours of silence, Sudan's information minister accused Israel of being behind the explosion.

Sudan, which analysts say is used as an arms smuggling route to the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip via neighboring Egypt, has blamed Israel for such strikes in the past but Israel has always either refused to comment or said it neither admitted nor denied involvement.

"We believe that Israel is behind it," Information Minister Ahmed Belal Osman told reporters on Wednesday, adding that "the planes had appeared to approach the site from the east."

"Sudan reserves the right to strike back at Israel," he said, saying two citizens had been killed and that the plant had been partially destroyed.

"We are now certain that this flagrant attack was authorized by the same state of Israel. The main purpose is to frustrate our military capabilities and stop any development there and ultimately weaken our national sovereignty," Osman said.

He said his country has the right to respond and may take the issue to the UN Security Council.