Cross-border tensions: Cairo withdraws Tel Aviv ambassador
Egypt withdrew its ambassador from Israel on Saturday, saying that the killing of five Egyptian security personnel while Israeli forces pursued gunmen across the border was a breach of its 1979 peace treaty with the Jewish state.
Israel said it regretted the deaths, which followed attacks inside Israel that killed eight people and sparked the most serious crisis in Israeli-Egyptian ties since former Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak’s overthrow in February.
Israel said it hoped that after Barak’s remarks the Egyptian envoy, who had not yet left, would remain in Tel Aviv.
“We hope that the ambassador will not be recalled,” Yigal Palmor, a Foreign Ministry spokesman, said. “He’s still here.”
Egypt “lays on Israel the political and legal responsibility for this incident, which constitutes a breach of the peace treaty between Egypt and Israel”, the cabinet said in an official statement posted on its web site.
Israeli Defence Minister Ehud Barak said Israel regretted the deaths of Egyptian security personnel. Seeking to ease the tension with Cairo, he said he had instructed the Israeli army to conduct a joint investigation with Egypt into the incident.
Egypt’s foreign ministry will summon the Israeli charge d’affaires to “convey Egypt’s official protest over gunfire from the Israeli side in a way that led to victims falling inside Egypt,” state news agency Mena quoted a ministry official as saying. He said the Israeli ambassador was not in Cairo.
The official said Egypt planned to ask for a “formal joint investigation to uncover the circumstances of the incident and pin down those responsible and take legal procedures to safeguard the rights of the Egyptian victims and casualties”.
Hundreds of Egyptians protested at the Israeli embassy in Cairo overnight, burning Israeli flags and demanding the expulsion of the Israeli envoy.
A senior Israeli defence official earlier said Israel seems keen to maintain its peace treaty with Egypt.
“One thing is for sure, there is not a single person in Israel who wants to harm an Egyptian policeman or soldiers,” Amos Gilad, a liaison officer with the Palestinians and Egypt, said on Israel Radio.
He said an investigation had not yet determined who had killed the Egyptian security personnel.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had been consulting cabinet ministers about a response, said an official who asked not to be named.
The cabinet decisions followed a crisis meeting attended by army generals and Egyptian intelligence chief Murad Muwafi.
“The cabinet committee has decided to withdraw the Egyptian ambassador in Israel until the result of investigations by the Israeli authorities is provided and an apology from the Israeli leadership over the hasty and regrettable statements about Egypt is given,” the cabinet statement said.
Published in The Express Tribune, August 21st, 2011.
COMMENTS (7)
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@Billoo Bhaya: Billo .. WOW.. I did not know you were such a die hard supporter of Israel. Why? Hahaha... I understand why.. Killers od kashmiri Muslims and terrorists behing 30 eyars of terrorism in Sri lanka is very obvious for your terrorist stand. Oh Bhayya Ji, have not you seen what Hezbollah did to isreal when they invaded Lebenon? There is a answer for your lil RSS terrorist mind here in that event..Chalo ab araam karo mere Munnay!!!!
Israel needs to pay for its atrocities. a full scale invasion needs to be launched by the Arab World & Iran, to eliminate the criminal Zionist entity. This attack on the Egyptian security was unjustified and deliberate. Why did Israel never kill Egyptians during Hosni Mubarak's reign, after attacks were launched from the Sinai (e.g August 2010)? The attack on the buses had nothing to do with Egypt or Hamas, yet Palestinian civilians & Egyptian police were killed!? How can this be allowed to happen? If Iran did the same to Israel, there would be a full scale Western-backed Israeli attack on Iran's people and military. Needless to say, the attack on the vehicles were justfied, after Israeli bombarding of the Gaza earlier this month. The attacks on the Israeli people serve Israel right for their occupation and settlement. Israel should never have been created, and, God Willing, it will be eliminated from the face of the earth in the near-future; with a harmonious, fair Palestinian State instead, based on the Quran & Sunnah. Israel with fall, and with it the capitalist USA terrorists with it.
Make Palestine the Zionists' Vietnam!
It is in everybody's interest to the eliminate the Israeli tyrants and end Jewish rule in Palestine!
Same thing happened when militants from Afghanistan attacked Pakistani areas and fled across the border. Pakistan forces followed them into Afghanistan. Nobody minded that.
But, now that Israel is doing the same thing the rules of the game suddenly change, dont they!
@Billoo Bhaya:
The days of Israel calling the shots are coming to an end. Decline of dictatorships in the Arab world, the relative decline of the US and the growing global impatience with Israel's apartheid and anti-human policies will go a long way to earn Palestinians their due right as free people. The winds of change are blowing across the scene. These winds would soon turn into a gathering storm which would blow away the Zionists' house of cards.
... This cowtowing to our enemies is frankly shameful and makes my skin crawl. If the same had been done to the egyptian embassy in TA, Egypt would have rescinded the peace treaty on the spot. We need to tell Egypt to shove it, and cut all ties. If the savages want to make an issue of it, so be it....on their heads. This time the enemy in the WH in washington will not stop us....Cairo will fall if egypt pushed Israel.
Are you Egyptians for real? Why were the 2 Egyptian policemen (sadly) killed? An armed attack from within Egyptian territory was carried out against Israeli civilians, killing 8 of them. Israel fired back with full justification. The policemen were not targeted, their deaths were an unfortunate accident. When will you face the truth? Only when Egypt applies its sovereignty in Sinai as it should, will incidents like this be prevented. At the moment north Sinai is a safe haven for terrorists. A new Afghanistan. Egypt must take charge of its own backyard.
Egypt better watch out in poking Israel. They should remember 1967 and 1973 when Israeli armor was poised on the road from Ismailiya to Cairo. They have a good deal in the demilitarization of Sinai with US giving them $2.5billion annually since 1979 Peace Treaty. Israel is more potent state now than in earlier wars and this time will wipe out Egypt to once again redraw borders at Suez Canal.