CAIRO: Egyptian police sources reported finding at least two tons of explosives hidden in three separate caches in the Sinai village of Raythan.
The find comes less than 10 days after police along the Gaza border seized 195 crates of automatic weapons and ammunition believed to be readied for smuggling to Palestinian factions in the occupied territories.
Four men thought to be behind the smuggling operations were arrested in a subsequent security sweep of Sinai.
Last week, Israeli forces held off launching a major operation to seek and destroy tunnels used for arms and drugs smuggling along the Philadelphi Corridor, an 11 km. stretch that is only 100 m wide.
But according to former Ambassador to Israel Mohammed Bassiouny, Egypt is also concerned about arms making their way back into Sinai, which has seen bombing attacks at tourist hotspots in the past two years.
The tunnels can be used both ways, he said, We don’t want weapons, drugs or people being smuggled into Egypt. [Therefore] we are opposed to the tunnels and we destroy them.
Bassiouny told The Daily Star Egypt that Israel “might be forced to re-engage in the area if it believed Hamas was still effectively using the tunnels to smuggle weapons into Gaza.
Dr. Mohammed Kadry Saeed, military expert at Al-Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies, earlier said that reports of Egyptian police being moved into the area were part of efforts by the government to secure the region and prevent further acts of violence in the Sinai Peninsula.
“The current Egyptian redeployment is an effort to secure the tunnels . and prove to Israel that the smuggling going on in the border tunnels is not occurring with its tacit approval, Saeed he told The Daily Star Egypt last week.
