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March 5, 2004/Adar 12 5764, Vol. 56, No. 24
Seeking help from Egypt with Gaza withdrawal
GIL SEDAN
Jewish Telegraphic Agency
JERUSALEM - After Israel's prime minister an-nounced he was planning to withdraw unilaterally from the Gaza Strip, several weeks passed before Israeli officials realized they were neglecting an important detail: Egypt, Gaza's other neighbor.
Now Israeli officials ap-parently are beginning to realize that before making significant changes at home, it pays to consult with one's neighbors.
The southwestern corner of the Gaza Strip borders Egypt's Sinai Desert. Israeli forces currently are deployed along that 12-mile corridor, known as the "Philadelphia Axis." Israel retained control of the corridor after the Palestinian Authority took over the Gaza Strip in 1994.
A complete withdrawal from Gaza would mean giving up that control, which could be trouble for Israel.
Time and again, Palesti-nians have dug tunnels under this Israeli-controlled border area, which in some places is several hundred yards wide, to smuggle arms into Gaza from Egypt. Those arms include rockets with the capability of reaching Israeli towns and cities.
Every so often, the Israeli army pushes into the southern Gaza town of Rafah to destroy the arms-smuggling tunnels, which appear to run largely unimpeded on the Egyptian side.
If this is the case when the Israel Defense Forces retains ultimate control over the area, one can only imagine the scope of arms-smuggling operations into Gaza once the soldiers leave that line.
Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has indicated that he intends to have Israeli soldiers leave "Philadelphia" as part of the overall departure from Gaza, but it is now clear that no such move can take place without full Egyptian cooperation.
When the United States was pressing Israel to withdraw from the Palestinian-popul-ated Gaza Strip in cooperation with the Palestinians and the Egyptians, Israel said the Palestinians were uninter-ested in cooperating.
However, Israel had no problem with the idea of coordinating the withdrawal with the Egyptians.
Negotiations between Israel and Egypt already have begun. Meir Dagan, head of the Mossad security agency, visited Egypt recently for discussions on the matter.
This week, Sharon's two envoys in Washington told U.S. officials that Israel wants U.S. help persuading Egypt to secure the Gaza Strip once Israel withdraws.
The United States says it is ready to help, but an admin-istration official expressed doubts that the Egyptians would want to assume responsibility for pursuing Palestinian terrorists.
Nadil Fahmy, Egypt's ambassador to Washington, said his country was interested in the proposal but needed to know more. Egypt would participate if the withdrawal were part of negotiations with the Palestinians, Fahmy told JTA.
While Egypt endorses an Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, it is concerned over possible repercussions.
They are well aware of the possible complications of any close involvement with the 1.3 million Palestinians on their northern border.
If Hamas takes over Gaza after an Israeli withdrawal, Egypt is worried that it could provide a boost to the radical Islamic fundamentalist movement inside Egypt itself.
Aside from Egyptian re-ticence, there remain other major problems to a possible Egyptian takeover of security responsibility along the Gaza border.
According to the terms of Egypt's peace treaty with Israel, both countries can deploy only limited forces along the border. An amendment of that treaty would be required for Egypt to take over effective control of the border.
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