If you read the letter to the end you will understand. The confirmation comes below.
Let's begin at the border though:
"Egypt eases entry restrictions on Palestinians" by Sarah el Deeb | Associated Press, July 24, 2012
CAIRO — Egypt is allowing freer temporary entry for Palestinians into the country in an unprecedented move that eases long-imposed travel restrictions, particularly on Gazans, Egyptian and Palestinian officials said Monday.
And then two weeks later the 'terrorists" attack? Cui bono?
The decision has caused confusion among the security agencies here and appeared to bring some resistance. Some officers at the airport refused to implement the measures, an airport official said, in a sign of how deeply some in the security forces view the Palestinians as a potential threat.
The Egyptian forces have been cooperating with Israel for waaaaaaaaaaaaaay too long!!!!!!
Even as some officials initially denied any easing, airport officials said seven Gazans were allowed into Egypt by dawn Monday without the usual restrictions.
The changes appeared to be a gesture to the Palestinians after separate meetings last week between Egypt’s new president, Mohammed Morsi of the Muslim Brotherhood, and Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas and the leader of Hamas, Khaled Mashaal, whose group controls Gaza.
They have a neighbor that doesn't appreciate that much.
Egypt’s powerful security agencies have monopolized policy-making toward the Palestinians for years, generally working closely with Israel and taking a tough line for fear of Hamas and the spread of militancy.
Well, they have a brother in the hood now, so.....
But security forces have been shaken since the fall last year of Hosni Mubarak — and now particularly with the election of an Islamist as his successor. The initial reaction from some officials could reflect fear that the president was moving into their usual spheres of power.
The new measures ease the situation for those living in Gaza, which has been subject to a five-year-old Israeli blockade keeping them penned into the tiny Mediterranean coastal territory.
What they are describing in minimizing terms is the war-criminal Israeli siege on what has become the world's biggest open-air concentration camp.
The only non-Israeli outlet from the strip is through Egypt, and for years Cairo assisted the blockade.
I consider that criminal collaboration.
Even after Egypt officially opened the border crossing it imposed heavy restrictions.
Until now, any Palestinian under 40 was escorted by security agents to or from the Gaza border to ensure that the traveler spent no time in Egyptian territory. Palestinians saw the practice as a humiliation, especially because it often meant detention at the border or airport for up to three days, often in small rooms alongside criminals, as they waited for an escort.
But Palestinians are used to it, right?
The new measures end the procedure and allow Palestinians to cross through Egypt on their own arrangements, allowing them to stay in the country for up to 72 hours to do so.
The measures went into effect early Monday and took many security agencies by surprise because they came before a formal announcement was made.
An unidentified Egyptian official at the Rafah crossing separating Egypt and Gaza confirmed to the official news agency MENA that the ‘‘deportation’’ policy had been ‘‘abolished’’ at the crossing.
The official also said an existing black list for Palestinians barred from entering Egypt or traveling abroad is currently under review. Some names on the list date back to the 1970s, following Egypt’s peace deal with Israel.
Egypt’s ambassador to the West Bank, Yasser Othman, said that transiting Palestinians must have Palestinian national identification and passports, or a proof of residency in a third country.
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Just wondering what could happen that would get that border shut again.
Related: Egypt stages rare airstrikes on Sinai
Except it is a rewritten piece of WaPo s***.
What my printed paper gave me:
"The airstrikes appear to have been conducted with the blessing of Israel, which has pushed Egypt to aggressively tackle the rise of extremism along its border. A senior Israeli official declined to say whether Israel had been asked to sign off on the airstrikes.
They couldn't happen otherwise, and I guess the attack helped push Egypt. Cui bono?
The international military task force stationed in the Sinai, which includes a US infantry battalion, issued a statement Wednesday saying none of its troops had been hurt in the violence.
Huh? We have troops in the area?
The task force, known as the Multinational Force and Observers, said without elaborating that it was taking "extraordinary security precautions" to keep its personnel safe. Its leaders have declined this year to grant interviews about the security situation in the Sinai."
Meaning they were tipped of about the false flag attack.
That was scrubbed from the web because I wasted a lot of time typing in unique key words and came up with nothing.
Why wouldn't they want us to know that?
"Egypt boosts troop presence in Sinai desert; Move is a tacit easing of 1979 treaty with Israel" by Amy Teibel and Hamza Hendawi | Associated Press, August 10, 2012
CAIRO — Egyptian troops, light tanks, armored vehicles, and attack helicopters are pouring into the Sinai desert to root out increasingly aggressive Islamic militants in the most significant easing to date of a key provision in the landmark 1979 peace treaty with Israel: the demilitarization of the peninsula.
Even though their equipment is crap?
And when they fail, who will have to take over again, cui bono?
For more than 30 years, Egyptian soldiers with heavy weapons were virtually banned from much of Sinai to create a buffer between the longtime enemies. Now, Israel has green-lighted the surge in hopes that militants on its doorstep will be defeated.
But talk of formally changing the treaty remains just that, talk.
The reason may lie in the delicate realities of the new Egypt, where the anti-Israel Muslim Brotherhood has risen to political power — with one of its own as Egypt’s first president since the ouster of Hosni Mubarak last year. The Islamist group has said that Egypt will continue to abide by the accord. At the same time, it has repeatedly called for changes in the treaty’s limits on troops in Sinai, seen as humiliating.
Translation: the false flag was a test for Egypt. Are you with Israel or are you against Israel? They need to know before launching WWIII against Iran because Egypt is Israel's western front. I suspect the Egyptian people will reverse the decision as soon as the bombing starts.
But its calls may be mainly rhetoric for an Egyptian public among which anti-Israel feeling is high.
If so they are acting like my government!
Actually renegotiating the accord would require diplomatic gymnastics for the Brotherhood to keep its vow never to meet with Israeli officials. And any deal could be spun as the Brotherhood signing a peace agreement with its nemesis.
Israel is willing to bend troop limits. But it is tepid to formal amendments for fear of enshrining too much firepower on its border, especially when Egypt’s post-Mubarak future remains unclear.
A senior Israeli official said the question of amending the treaty was not raised by the Egyptians so far, or by the Israelis. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media.
‘‘No one is talking about changing the treaty,’’ said Israeli lawmaker and former defense minister Benjamin Ben-Eliezer.
Notice the talk has shifted from an open entrance to alleviate suffering to the state of the peace treaty that is so important to Israel?
Asked about calls to amend the deal, the spokesman for Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi, of the Brotherhood, avoided a direct response. ‘‘The state respects international accords but at the same time serves the interest of the nation and Egyptian citizens,’’ Yasser Ali said Tuesday.
The new Sinai offensive was sparked by a stunning surprise attack Sunday by militants that killed 16 Egyptian soldiers in Sinai near the border with Gaza and Israel.
It has underlined how much security cooperation still continues between Egypt and Israel despite the Brotherhood’s new prominence. Morsi may be president, but Mubarak-era military generals long accustomed to dealing with Israel still hold dominant authorities over him.
Before they were fired.
Yup, it sure is starting to look like a false flag.
Middle-ranking security officials from the two nations communicate regularly.
The 1979 peace deal won Egypt the return of the Sinai Peninsula, captured by Israel in the 1967 war. But it restricted numbers of troops and types of weapons Egypt could station there. Nothing more than a light weapon was allowed in most of the peninsula. Only police, no soldiers, were allowed in the zone directly on the border.
That has been altered twice since. After it pulled out from the Mediterranean coastal Gaza Strip in 2005, Israel allowed Egypt to deploy 750 military border guards.
That's humiliation!
Last year, the lawlessness in Sinai after Mubarak’s ouster prompted the Israelis to allow the deployment of some 3,500 troops with armored vehicles in the border zone.
Now Egypt is moving in more soldiers and sharply hiking its firepower after last weekend’s attack.
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And they are getting help:
"Israeli soldiers reported in Egypt; Said to be effort to stop migrants" by Mark Lavie | Associated Press, August 11, 2012
CAIRO — Israel has been sending soldiers into Egypt’s Sinai desert to stop African migrants before they reach the border and handing them over to Egyptian forces, human rights groups charged in a report released Friday.
The groups called on Israel to stop the practice.
Related: Repairing Israel's Image
It's beyond repair at this point.
Israel has been increasingly concerned over the numbers of African migrants sneaking across the porous border. Most come from Sudan, South Sudan, and Eritrea. About 60,000 migrants are already in Israel, and some Israelis have expressed concern that the influx could harm the Jewish character of their state.
I find supremacism so distasteful.
A senior Egyptian military official in Sinai denied that any Israeli soldiers entered Egypt to chase migrants. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to the press.
The Israeli military spokesman’s office said it would not confirm or deny the specific report, as is military policy. But it added, ‘‘in line with protocol, Israeli military activity is within Israel.’’
It said Israeli forces are working ‘‘to prevent the infiltration of both hostile terror elements as well as criminal smuggling.’’ It said Israeli soldiers have stopped groups several times and held them ‘‘until the arrival of Egyptian forces that took the infiltrators,’’ but did not comment on where this took place.
The groups said the Israeli military censor banned Israel-based journalists from writing about the report.
And yet they constantly flog the "we are the only democracy in the region" shtick.
The use of Israeli soldiers just inside Egyptian territory, with apparent Egyptian consent, would be a startling move, given widespread anti-Israeli sentiment among Egyptians and the strong sensitivities over Sinai, which Israel captured in the 1967 war and returned after the 1979 peace deal between the two countries. Cooperation with Israel is a touchy subject in Egypt, which has had cool relations with Israel since the peace treaty was signed.
Mubarak was about as warm to them as any Arab or Muslim leader, but don't let that interfere with the poor, always threatened, set-upon Jew narrative pushed by my Zionist-controlled agenda-pusher we call a newspaper.
The report came as tension rose over the security situation in the lawless desert, where Islamic militants killed 16 Egyptian soldiers, stole armored vehicles, and drove into Israel, apparently to carry out a further attack until they were struck by Israeli forces. Egypt has deployed additional troops in the peninsula near the borders with Israel and Gaza in an operation to stamp out militant groups.
The report, released Friday by Amnesty International and several Israeli groups, including Hotline for Migrant Workers and the Association for Civil Rights in Israel, said that Israeli soldiers have entered several hundred yards into Egyptian territory to catch migrants and hand them over to Egyptian police.
The report cited an Israeli soldier and several migrants whose relatives were seized by Israeli soldiers inside Egyptian territory.
In an affidavit included in the report, the Israeli reserve soldier says his unit was posted in June several hundred yards inside Egypt to stop African migrants.
The soldier describes three incidents in which his unit dealt with African migrants on the Egyptian side. On two occasions Israeli soldiers marched the groups several miles along the border on the Egyptian side and handed them over to Egyptian police.
In the other, he writes that soldiers guarded a group of about 40 migrants, including women and a baby, for two days before the migrants dispersed, and most crossed into Israel.
The soldier’s name is blacked out. A Tel Aviv attorney countersigned the statement.
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"US and Egypt negotiate new military aid after attack in Sinai" by THOM SHANKER and Steven Lee Myers | New York Times August 12, 2012
WASHINGTON — In the wake of the attack that killed 16 Egyptian soldiers near the border with Israel last Sunday, the United States and Egypt are negotiating a package of assistance to address what administration officials described as a worsening security vacuum in the Sinai Peninsula.
Egypt’s new president, Mohammed Morsi, and its military leaders balked last month when Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta each separately pressed them to act more aggressively against extremists operating in Sinai. But after the attack, Egypt appears to have overcome its sensitivities about sovereignty and have accelerated talks over the details of new US assistance, which would include military equipment, police training, and electronic and aerial surveillance, the officials said.
And CUI BONO?!!!?
The attack — in which at least 35 masked gunmen raided an Egyptian border post and commandeered two military vehicles they used to try to storm the border with Israel — has deeply shaken Morsi’s government. It led to the dismissal of the country’s intelligence chief and a retaliatory military operation that included the first helicopter airstrikes in Sinai since Israel ended its occupation in 1982.
American and Israeli officials now see Egypt’s response to the attack as an important test of Morsi’s nascent presidency and, more broadly, the country’s commitment to security after the uprising in 2011 that toppled then-President Hosni Mubarak.
I rest my case.
While the US military has long had ties to its Egyptian counterpart, the deeper, more direct effort now under discussion could bind the United States and Egypt more closely against the shared threat of extremism.
Actually, the Egyptians are already clued in about 9/11 and "Al-CIA-Duh" even if the government pukes are going along with the charade.
It could also overcome reservations among some in Washington about Morsi’s affiliation with the Muslim Brotherhood, a group long reviled by US officials for its anti-Western views and Islamist politics.
The Pentagon is discussing a variety of options for sharing intelligence with Egypt’s military and police in Sinai. They include intercepts of cellphone or radio conversations of militants suspected of plotting attacks and overhead imagery provided by aircraft — both piloted and drones — or satellites, the officials said.
The talks are taking place through military and intelligence channels that the two countries have used for decades, as well as with Morsi’s new government. Clinton spoke by telephone with Morsi’s new prime minister, Hesham Qandil, to offer condolences and discuss greater assistance.
Related: Clinton Gets Commitment From Egyptian General
Egypt, though it receives $1.5 billion a year in arms and other military assistance from the United States, is deeply averse to direct US involvement in its security and, in public at least, plays down the aid assistance it has received.
This in a time of austerity for you, 'murkns.
Even the more routine assistance under discussion — including equipment and training of its border police — has faced resistance, but after talks last week, the officials said they were optimistic that Morsi’s government would allow greater military-to-military collaboration.
It was not yet clear who carried out last Sunday’s attack, which US officials described as disturbingly sophisticated.
Oh, I'm pretty sure I know who it was. Has all the hallmarks on an intelligence operation.
The officials expressed fear that future attacks could lead, inadvertently or not, to a clash between Israel and Egypt that could threaten the peace treaty between them.
And who wants more war in this world?
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"Suspected militants killed in Sinai" Associated Press, August 13, 2012
EL-ARISH, Egypt — Egyptian security forces killed seven suspected militants Sunday during raids on hideouts in two villages in northern Sinai, security officials said.
Tensions in Sinai, the desert peninsula that borders Israel and the Gaza Strip, have escalated sharply over the past week after suspected militants killed 16 Egyptian soldiers near the border.
Sunday’s deaths were the first reported casualties among suspected militants since Egypt launched a major offensive against the groups and sent reinforcements to the area following the attack last week.
Security officials said the raids by troops and police backed by armored vehicles targeted the villages near El-Arish of al-Ghora and al-Mahdiyah.
They seized land mines, an antiaircraft missile, heavy machine guns, and grenades. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media.
Israel happy now?
They said the seven suspected militants were killed when the forces shelled a house in which they took cover after an exchange of fire.
The shelling set the house on fire along with a car and a motorbike parked outside.
In a separate event, three policemen were killed and four others injured when their car turned over while chasing a group of criminals in central Sinai, Egypt’s official Middle East News Agency, MENA, reported.
It also said that suspected militants fired at a security checkpoint before escaping in northern Sinai on Saturday.
No casualties were reported.
Large swathes of northern Sinai have plunged into lawlessness following Hosni Mubarak’s ouster in the uprising last year, with a massive flow of arms smuggled from Libya finding their way into the hands of disgruntled Bedouins.
Oh, another fruit of Libyan democracy. It is becoming clear to me that Khadafy was also overthrown so that his arsenal could be funneled to "Al-CIA-Duh."
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Come to think of it, I'm tired of the BG shenanigans.
