GAZA CITY: Five Palestinians were killed yesterday when an explosion collapsed a tunnel running under the border between the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip and Egypt, a hospital official said. “The bodies of three other Palestinians were found buried in the tunnel during the night,” said an official in Rafah’s Abu Yusuf Al-Najah hospital in Rafah.
The bodies of two other people were found immediately after the blast ripped through tunnel located in Rafah, which straddles the border. Earlier, medics said at least four people were injured in the explosion, the cause of which was not immediately known.
Several Palestinians have died in similar incidents in recent months in the tunnels, which are used to smuggle arms, fuel and other supplies into Gaza. The impoverished coastal strip has been under a crippling Israeli blockade since the Islamist Hamas movement - which is sworn to the destruction of the Jewish state - seized power in June 2007.
Meanwhile, Egyptian police have found a cache of weapons and explosives in the Sinai desert which they say was destined for the Gaza Strip, a security official said yesterday.
“Police on Tuesday found one ton of TNT explosives as well large quantities of hand grenades and mortar shells in the Sadr El-Hitan area in central Sinai,” the official told AFP in El-Arish. He said a tip-off from local residents led police to the cache but that no arrests had been made in connection with the find.
Israel and the United States have repeatedly accused Cairo of not doing enough about the problem of underground tunnels linking Gaza and Egypt used to smuggle weapons, food, fuel and cigarettes into the impoverished territory.
Israeli soldiers have also killed an Egyptian smuggler who had sneaked across the border, a security official told AFP yesterday. Suleiman Sweilam Suleiman, 26, was killed “earlier this week” by the Israeli Army after he crossed from the Sinai Peninsula into Israel and is suspected to have planned to sell drugs, the official said. “Israeli authorities have informed us that they will return his body to Egypt within the next two days,” the official said.
In a separate incident, Egyptian police arrested 17 Egyptians suspected of people smuggling and 28 African migrants trying to enter Israel illegally, another security official said.
The Sudanese, Ethiopian and Eritrean migrants were arrested while trying to cross the desert border into Israel on Tuesday night and Wednesday, security sources said. Also on Tuesday, Egyptian police raided homes in the Sinai and arrested 17 Egyptians suspected of helping migrants cross into Israel.
The porous 250-kilometer border has become a major transit route for migrants, asylum-seekers and drug smugglers. African migrants in Egypt complain of poor treatment and discrimination. Hundreds have been arrested trying to slip into Israel.
In another development, Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit said Tuesday that talks with Morocco had led to a united Arab candidacy for the post of UNESCO director general, which falls vacant next year.
According to the minister, after bilateral discussions Rabat announced that it was withdrawing its former UNESCO ambassador, Aziza Benani, from the running for the four-year post, paving the way for Egypt’s long-serving Culture Minister Faruk Hosni to mount a “sole Arab candidacy.”
