Tag Archive for smuggler tunnels

Egypt’s army destroyed 20 more smuggling tunnels under Gaza border in November

 

The 20 tunnels that were found & destroyed in November are part of Egypt’s policy, after it cleared a buffer zone along the Gaza border last year, in its attempt to eliminate the cross-border network of tunnels used for terrorism in the Sinai, & smuggling weapons to Hamas and other terror organizations in Gaza.

By The Associated Press & Israel Hayom Staff

 

The Egyptian military says it has destroyed 20 recently discovered underground tunnels along the border with the Gaza Strip.

A Palestinian worker repairs a smuggling tunnel after it was flooded by Egyptian security forces – Photo: Reuters

The army says the tunnels were found and destroyed in November. Continue Reading »

Egypt’s flooding Gaza’s tunnels dampens Hamas’ smuggling business

 

After refusing to close the smuggling tunnels out of Gaza, the Egyptian army’s campaign to flood every tunnel crossing into the country has provoked the ire of the Palestinians.

By Reuters

 

Mahmoud Bakeer speaks with despair about the night of the flash flood, when he screamed at his wife and five children to flee their home on Gaza’s border with Egypt as the water rushed in. 

They made it to safety during the flooding last week, but a network of Palestinian tunnels running under the frontier town of Rafah is now water-logged, destroyed by Cairo to sever what it says is a weapons smuggling route out of Gaza for Islamist insurgents in Egypt’s Sinai desert. Continue Reading »

Egyptian Army Floods Hamas Tunnels From Gaza

 

By REUTERS

 

Egyptian forces flooded smuggling tunnels dug beneath the Gaza-Egypt border, in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip, on Friday Palestinian witnesses said.

The authorities used pipes to pump water from the Mediterranean Sea in an apparent effort to curb the use of the underground passages.

Tunnel workers attempted to remove the water.

The network of tunnels is used to bring in an estimated 30 percent of all goods that reach Gaza. Continue Reading »

Israel TV-1 Reports: Egypt Declares Death Sentence to Gaza Tunnel-Diggers

Israel TV news reporting al-Sisi declaring Sunday that anyone convicted of digging or assisting to tunnel into Egypt would face the death penalty.

By Yaakov Levi

 

Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi declared Sunday that anyone convicted of digging tunnels into Gaza from Sinai or of assisting in such activity would face a death sentence, according to a report on Israel’s Channel 1 TV.

Al-Qaeda supporters in the Sinai – Reuters

Sunday proved to be another bloody day in Egypt, as at least five people were killed and some 30 injured in bomb blasts outside a police station in the Sinai town of El Arish, news agencies said.
Continue Reading »

World Remains Silent as Gazans Suffer Continued Egyptian Expulsion

Palestinians along Egypt’s border complain of constant explosions ‘worse than IDF operation’ as their homes are demolished, & Gaza’s economy collapses.

By Ari Yashar

 

Residents in Gaza’s south, and particularly the Sinai border town of Rafah, are being expelled from their homes and having them demolished by dynamite and bulldozers – an expulsion world media has largely shied away from because it is being conducted by the Egyptian army.

The Egyptian expulsion to create a buffer zone follows lethal terrorist attacks on Egyptian soldiers in the Sinai last month, and the ensuing crackdown on smuggling tunnels from Gaza by which Hamas reportedly armed the attackers has already seen hundreds of homes destroyed. Continue Reading »

Egypt to double width of buffer zone with pariah Gaza after kilometer-long tunnels found

 

Cairo’s decision to widen its security buffer zone comes after discovery of Hamas’s underground terror-tunnels measuring up to kilometer in length.

By REUTERS

 

CAIRO – Egypt will double to one kilometer (0.62 mile) the depth of a security buffer zone it is clearing on its border with the Gaza Strip after some of the worst anti-state violence since President Mohamed Morsi was overthrown last year.

 Gaza Strip

An Egyptian soldier keeps guard on the border between Egypt and southern Gaza Strip. – Photo: REUTERS

Egypt declared a state of emergency in the border area after at least 33 security personnel were killed last month in two attacks in the Sinai Peninsula, a remote but strategic region bordering Israel, Gaza and the Suez Canal.

Continue Reading »

Egyptian Soldiers Die Destroying Hamas Smuggling Tunnel From Gaza

Egyptian army officers among the dead when Hamas-run smuggling tunnel from Gaza collapses during demolition operation.

By Arutz Sheva Staff

 

Two Egyptian army officers and a soldier were killed Saturday when a smuggling tunnel connecting Sinai and the Gaza Strip collapsed as they were preparing to blow it up, officials said.

One soldier was injured and another missing in the collapse, which happened as troops were planting explosives.

The army says it has destroyed more than 1,600 such tunnels – most of them since the ouster of president Mohamed Morsi last year – which the Hamas terrorist group uses to smuggle in arms, equipment and money. Continue Reading »

Palestinian infiltrating Sinai through Gaza smuggling tunnel killed by Egyptian army

 

One shot to death, 2 others arrested after the the 3 ignored Egyptian border guards’ orders to stop, then tried to return via the Gaza tunnel instead.

By Ynetnews

 

 

A Palestinian man trying to infiltrate Sinai through a smuggling tunnel was shot dead and two others arrested by the Egyptian army on Saturday, Palestinian media reported.

Egyptian soldiers on Gaza border – Photo: AP

The three were spotted exiting a tunnel near the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier on the Egyptian side of Rafah.

The Egyptian border guards ordered them to stop, but instead the three Palestinians tried to return into the tunnel. Continue Reading »

Karma: German family smuggled into Gaza is denied entry to Egypt

Egypt border officials say mother & children, who are German citizens, did not have Rafah-crossing entry stamps in their passports.

 

A mother from the Gaza Strip and her children were denied entry to Egypt because they had previously used smuggling tunnels to enter Gaza, a media report says.

Rafah crossing, August 27, 2014.

Palestinians at the Rafah crossing between Egypt and the southern Gaza Strip on August 27, 2014. – Photo: AFP

Egyptian authorities told the Palestinian Ma’an news agency that the family members, who have German citizenship, were stopped at the border when they tried to enter Egypt.

Their passports did not have entry stamps to Gaza, indicating that they had entered through the tunnels instead of through the Rafah crossing, Ma’an reported.

Continue Reading »

Egyptian soldier shoots dead Gaza smuggler entering illegally via Hamas terror-tunnel

The Palestinian Ma’an news agency reports a 2nd Palestinian man escaped near Rafah.

Egyptian Authorities announced early this year it destroyed 1,370 of Hamas’ smuggling tunnels from Gaza.

 

Egyptian soldiers shot and killed a Palestinian man Wednesday who was attempting to enter Egypt through a tunnel that exited near Rafah, the Palestinian news agency Ma’an reported.

Hamas operatives inside an underground tunnel in Gaza on August 18, 2014.

Hamas operatives inside an underground tunnel in Gaza on August 18, 2014. – Photo: Reuters

Citing Egyptian security sources, Ma’an said a second man escaped.
Egyptian border guards opened fire when they spotted two people exiting the tunnel, according to the report.

Continue Reading »

None of 160 children killed digging tunnels for Hamas were investigated by Gaza Police

Tunnels that lead into Israel & Egypt and dug using children’s “nimble bodies” were never stopped by police in Gaza, despite having over 160 fatal ‘work accidents’.

By JPOST.COM STAFF

 

Hamas used children to help them dig numerous tunnels into Israel and Egypt, a 2012 paper written for the Journal of Palestine Studies reported.

Hamas camp in Gaza

Palestinian youngsters in Gaza take part in a Hamas military training camp. – Photo: REUTERS

The paper, titled Gaza’s Tunnel Phenomenon: The Unintended Dynamics of Israel’s Siege says that little had been done to stop the phenomenon of child labor during the digging the tunnels by Hamas in Gaza.

Continue Reading »

Egypt military destroys 13 more Hamas tunnels on its border

 

As the IDF works to destroyed terror-tunnels leading into Israel, Egypt continues in its own battle against Hamas’ underground smuggling network into the Sinai.

By AFP

 

Egypt’s army said Sunday it has destroyed 13 more tunnels connecting the Sinai Peninsula to the Gaza Strip, taking to 1,639 the overall number it has laid waste to.

tunnels being destroyed

tunnels being destroyed

Cairo has poured troops into the peninsula to counter a rising insurgency since the ouster of Islamist president Mohamed Morsi last year, and its security operation involves the destruction of these tunnels.

The Palestinian militant group Hamas, which is the main power in Gaza, reportedly uses the tunnels to smuggle arms, food and money into the blockaded coastal enclave. Continue Reading »

Egypt security officials arrests 15 ISIS militants that entered Sinai via Gaza tunnels

After tracking militant cell crossing from Gaza through tunnels at Rafah, Egyptian special forces arrest 15 militants.

By JPOST.COM STAFF

Egyptian special forces tracked and arrested a terrorist cell which had used tunnels to cross from Gaza into the Sinai Peninsula, Ma’ariv reported on Saturday. The 15 militants arrested belong to the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS).

jihadist al-Qaida fighters

ISIS fighters – Photo: REUTERS

Further interrogation of the cell by Egyptian forces revealed that the group’s intent was to relay messages and set up terrorist cells for the ISIS in Egypt, to fight the Egyptian government.

For its part, the Gaza Interior Ministry rejected the claims by Egyptian security sources that the militants crossed into Sinai from Gaza. Continue Reading »

6 Hamas terrorists in Gaza killed when tunnel collapsed

 

Tunnel collapses on 12 Hamas terrorists from its military wing involved in ‘resistance activity’ by  ‘accidental explosion’, leaving half dead according to Hamas official.

By AFP

 

GAZA CITY – An explosion killed six members of Izzadine al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of Hamas, in a tunnel under the Israeli border Thursday, Palestinian officials said.

Hamas tunnel in Rafah, Gaza (Photo: EPA)

Hamas tunnel in Rafah, Gaza – Photo: EPA

“Five martyrs were killed in a resistance activity in Saghira neighborhood” in eastern Gaza City, the local Hamas information office said, without elaborating. Later a Hamas official confirmed six men had been killed.

A security source told AFP the “accidental explosion” happened “inside of an Al-Qassam Brigades tunnel, which collapsed on some 12 members.” Continue Reading »

Egypt criminalizes Gaza smuggling tunnels

 

New Egyptian law criminalizes construction or operation of smuggling tunnels to Gaza making violation of the law punishable by imprisonment.

By i24news

 

Egyptian sources announced the passage of a new law criminalizing the construction and operation of tunnels running between Egypt and the Gaza Strip, Ma’an reported.

Tents cover entrances of tunnels used for smuggling along the Gaza-Egypt border, near the southern Gaza Strip town of Rafah on August 6 2012 – Photo: AFP

The State Council included an article in the law according to Penal Code Law 82 subjecting anyone constructing, operating, or using tunnels between Egypt and a neighboring territory to imprisonment. Continue Reading »