Egyptian Anti-Aircraft Missiles Reported in Sinai

[Al Bhatti]

August 20, 2012

Egypt to ‘send’ aircraft, tanks into Sinai for first time since 1973 war

Egypt is preparing to use aircraft and tanks in Sinai as part of its offensive against militants in the border area, security sources told Reuters on Monday, while the Israeli army announced it deployed an Iron Dome air defense system near the Egyptian border.

Egypt’s plans to step up the offensive will include using such military vehicles in Sinai for the first time since the 1973 war with Israel.

The plans were being finalized by Egypt’s newly appointed Defense Minister General Abdel Fattah al-Sisi as he made his first visit to Sinai on Monday following the killing of 16 border guards on Aug. 5.

Egypt blamed the attack on Islamist militants and the conflict is an early test for President Mohamed Mursi - elected in June following the overthrow last year of Hosni Mubarak - to prove he can rein in militants on the border with Israel.

“Al-Sisi will supervise the putting together of final plans to strike terrorist elements using aircraft and mobile rocket launchers for the first time since the beginning of the operation,” an Egyptian security source said.

Another security source said the army was planning to attack and besiege al-Halal mountain in central Sinai, using weapons including tanks, where militants were suspected to be hiding.

Meanwhile, the Israeli military said on Monday it would deploy its Iron Dome air defense system, designed to intercept and destroy rockets, at the border.

The move came days after two rockets were fired at the town of Eilat near the border with Egypt, a military spokeswoman said.

“An Iron Dome battery has been deployed in the town of Eilat as part of tests, momentarily modifying the sites where these systems are deployed,” she said but did not give further details.

An Islamist militant group claimed responsibility for the two rocket attacks aimed at Eilat, Israel’s Red Sea resort town, SITE Intelligence Group reported on Thursday.

A group calling itself Ansar Jerusalem claimed to be responsible for firing “two Grad rockets into the city” which it said hit “inhabited targets”, in a statement posted on online jihadist forums, the U.S.-based monitoring agency said.

On Wednesday, evening, Israeli police said two blasts rocked the city.

Debris of the rockets which were apparently fired from Egypt’s Sinai peninsula was later found.

Disorder has spread in North Sinai, a region that has felt neglected by the central government, since the overthrow of Mubarak in a popular uprising. Mubarak’s government had worked closely with Israel to keep the region under control and Islamist President Mursi has promised to restore stability.

The 1979 peace treaty between Israel and Egypt limited military presence in the desert peninsula though in recent years Israel agreed to allow Egypt to deploy more forces there to stem weapons smuggling by Palestinian gunmen and other crimes.

After the border attack this month, Egypt launched a joint army-police operation that has raided militant hideouts, arrested their members and seized weapons.

Israeli officials, who say they are in regular contact with Cairo, have encouraged Egypt to take tough action against the gunmen responsible for the assault and have previously allowed the use of helicopters in the operation.

No one has claimed responsibility for the killing of the border guards but a Sinai-based Islamist militant organization, the Salafi ****** Group, warned the Egyptian army last week that the crackdown would force it to fight back.

Egypt to


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August 20, 2012

Egypt to send tanks to Sinai

Egypt is preparing to use aircraft and tanks in Sinai for the first time since the 1973 war with Israel in its offensive against militants in the border area, security sources said on Monday.

The plans to step up the operation were being finalized by Egypt's newly appointed Defence Minister General Abdel Fattah al-Sisi as he made his first visit to Sinai on Monday following the killing of 16 border guards on 5 August.

Egypt blamed the attack on Islamist militants and the conflict is an early test for President Mohammed Mursi - elected in June following the overthrow last year of Hosni Mubarak - to prove he can rein in militants on the border with Israel.

"Al-Sisi will supervise the putting together of final plans to strike terrorist elements using aircraft and mobile rocket launchers for the first time since the beginning of the operation," an Egyptian security source said.

Another security source said the army was planning to attack and besiege al-Halal mountain in central Sinai, using weapons including tanks, where militants were suspected to be hiding.

Disorder has spread in North Sinai, a region with many guns that has felt neglected by the central government, since the overthrow of Mubarak in a popular uprising. Mubarak's government had worked closely with Israel to keep the region under control and Islamist President Mursi has promised to restore stability.

The 1979 peace treaty between both countries limited military presence in the desert peninsula though in recent years Israel agreed to allow Egypt to deploy more forces there to stem weapons smuggling by Palestinian gunmen and other crimes.

After the border attack this month, Egypt launched a joint army-police operation that has raided militant hideouts, arrested their members and seized weapons.

Israeli officials, who say they are in regular contact with Cairo, have encouraged Egypt to take tough action against the gunmen responsible for the assault and have previously allowed the use of helicopters in the operation.

No one has claimed responsibility for the killing of the border guards but a Sinai-based Islamist militant organization, the Salafi ****** Group, warned the Egyptian army last week that the crackdown would force it to fight back.

Al-Sisi was appointed defense minister last week in a surprise shake-up by Mursi, replacing Field Marshal Hussein Tantawi who served as Mubarak's defense minister for 20 years.

Egypt to send tanks to Sinai | Al Akhbar English

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An ex-senior Israeli official said a few days back that they were surprised by Mursi's move to remove Tantawi and that Mursi will not stop giving us (Israel) surprises.

 

[The SC]

ounce again Israeli arrogance at work, they just can not help their sickness of dictate (that is from which the term "dictator" stems from).

Israel "telling" Egypt to withdraw its defensive weapons from it own territory is a sign of Israeli madness.
Egypt should even have offensive weapons in there if it chooses to, since Israel has no depth at all, that should be a very potent deterrent against its nuclear claims and threats, it will be invaded in no time...

 

[agentny17]

Egypt's army operation in Sinai "well coordinated' with US and Israel: Military source

Israeli press criticises increased presence of Egyptian troops in the Sinai, however Operation Eagle was 'well coordinated' with both the US and Israel, says military source
Dina Ezzat , Tuesday 21 Aug 2012

An Egyptian military source, Sunday, rebuffed what he qualified as "the noise that is coming out of the Israeli media" over the deployment of army troops in Sinai beyond the limitations stipulated in the 1979 Camp David Accords.

Speaking on a condition of anonymity, the source told Ahram Online that recent complaints voiced in the Israeli press are part of an anti-Egypt propaganda campaign that is orchestrated to intimidate President Mohamed Morsi.

Over the past few days, Israeli dailies have dwelt on comments from their military officials criticising Egypt for increasing armed forces presence across Sinai without securing approval from Israel first.

According to the Camp David peace treaty, Sinai is divided into three areas and in each of these areas Egypt is allowed a limited deployment of troops and arms.

Area C, the closest to Israeli borders with Egypt, is the most restricted.

Egypt can increase its military presence upon obtaining consent from the self-proclaimed Jewish state. This has been the case over the course of the past few years, as Cairo ran several operations ridding the area of militants as well as monitoring human and drugs trafficking.

Since the bloody attack that killed 16 Egyptian border guards three weeks ago, Egyptian security forces have executed an ongoing operation to eliminate militant cells on the borders.

The operation, presidential spokesman Yasser Ali said, falls within the scope of Egyptian "sovereignty over Sinai, all of Sinai."

According to the military source speaking to Ahram online, “Operation Eagle” is, however, "well coordinated with both the Americans and Israelis."

"The fact that contact between both sides has not been made known to the press does not mean it is not happening – actually it goes beyond mere information sharing and includes efforts to coordinate," the source said.

He added that these meetings are conducted on a daily basis by officers and "at times has included high ranking personnel, including Minister of Defence [Abdel-Fattah] El-Sisi and his assistant General [Mohamed] El-Assar."

Minister El-Sisi who was appointed defence minister less than a week ago, arrived in Rafah, Monday, to personally follow up Operation Eagle.

The visit, the same military source said, is a clear indication that Egypt is "perfectly comfortable with what it is doing in Sinai and that it is determined to go on until the matter is finished."

"The matter" that this source talks about is not an easy one, according to Mohamed Abdel-Salam, strategic analyst at Al-Ahram Centre for Political and Strategic Studies. Eliminating Islamist militant presence that has mushroomed in Sinai over the last few years is a tough mission that will take time.

The military source said that it would take at least another four weeks. "It is a multi-phased operation," he explained.

The attack on Egyptian troops in Sinai followed a run of complaints from Israel, including an unprecedented letter to the UN Security Council denouncing Egypt’s failing security efforts to control regional militants working with counterparts in Gaza in the peninsula.

According to both military personnel and political figures alike, the attack revealed the failure of the armed forces to properly control Sinai. "Clearly it was a big embarrassment," the military source admitted.

This attack allowed Morsi, with the reported consent of the US and the support of certain quarters within the military, to retire Field Marshal Hussein Tantawi, minister of defence for over 20 years. This ended the duality of power that was implicitly shared between Morsi as elected president and Tantawi as head of the military council that had been running the state since the January 25 Revolution toppled Hosni Mubarak.

The departure of Tantawi came at the end of several forced retirements of top military and intelligence officials, moves also initiated by the disastrous Sinai border attack.

However in a Washington Post article published Sunday, Dennis Ross, a former US Middle East envoy and head of a pro-Israel think-tank based in the US capital, criticised Morsi’s dealings in Sinai, adding it was part of his poor management of state affairs in general from economy to the rights of the Copts. Ross called on Washington to act to fix Morsi's policies on the restive region.

"This article feels suspicious because it reveals, as I think, an attempt to discredit the Egyptian efforts to eliminate the presence of Islamist militants in Sinai," said Abdel-Salam. "It is very clear that Israel and some of the country’s supporters in Washington are not content with the fact that Egypt is putting its feet on the ground in Sinai."

Fixing security in the peninsula, Abdel-Salam said, would deny Israel and its lobby in Washington a useful card they use against Egypt in Congress and with the administration.

"Every now and then (during the last few years of Mubarak's rule) someone from Washington would complain about the situation in Sinai and say that the military and economic assistance (that Egypt receives from the US as part of the 1979 peace treaty with Israel) would be negatively affected if Sinai is not fixed," Abdel-Salam added.

Egyptian diplomatic sources who have served in Washington and other western capitals say that during the past few months Israel has complained that Egypt is failing to request permission to increase its deployment of arms and officers in Sinai, to curb Islamist militant and traffickers’ activities in the region.

"Today, they are complaining that Egypt is actually using this green-light; basically Israel is complaining about Sinai one way or the other," commented one Egyptian diplomat.

According to the military source, once Operation Eagle is done, Egypt will return its deployment level to that outlined in the peace treaty with Israel. However, Egypt may well upgrade its intelligence functions in the region.

Would this involve a re-negotiation of Camp David Accords to allow for a permanent increase of troops in the region? “Possibly,” the military source answered.
Egypt's army operation in Sinai "well coordinated' with US and Israel: Military source - Politics - Egypt - Ahram Online

 

[Serpentine]

Here's a question: Who exactly are these terrorists and where do they come from?What they want?Who benefits the most from Sinai incident?

 

[BLACKEAGLE]

Here's a question: Who exactly are these terrorists and where do they come from?What they want?Who benefits the most from Sinai incident?

Very good questions, indeed. Thank you.

 

[p4kistan]

Where were these so called TERRORISTS prior, during and after the arab revolution?

If the sinai was de militarised to an extent surely these terrorists would have had free reign to do as they wished then.

Muslim brotherhood, Morsi look at the bigger picture. If you don't you won't have the nile very much longer.