CAIRO: A top security official said on Monday Egypt has cracked down on tunnels to Gaza and intercepted explosives destined for the enclave, a day after an Israeli official criticized its anti-smuggling efforts.
The Gaza Strip relies on a network of tunnels underneath its border with Egypt, which has been key in maintaining a blockade on Gaza first imposed in June 2006 after Palestinian insurgents there kidnapped an Israeli soldier.
The blockade was tightened a year later when the Islamist Hamas seized power in the tiny but densely populated territory.
The Egyptian official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said security forces have closed down dozens of tunnels this year but found none used for smuggling weapons.
He said security services have captured large quantities of explosives that were extracted from ordnance left over from Egypt’s wars with Israel, before the two countries signed a peace deal in 1979.
Other weapons were smuggled into Gaza by sea, he said.
"We set up dozens of checkpoints inside Rafah and along the roads leading to it to prevent smuggling operations. The weapons that reach Gaza come the sea, which is controlled by the Israeli navy," he said.
A senior Israeli intelligence official said on Sunday that Egypt was not doing enough to stop weapons smuggling to Gaza.
"There is a problem with Egypt – they are not doing enough to block the smuggling of weapons into the Gaza Strip," the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
The official said Cairo could do a lot more, particularly to stop the smugglers who have dug hundreds of tunnels under the border between Egypt and Gaza.
"Egypt has lost control of what is happening," he said, accusing Cairo of lacking motivation to do anything about it.
"Soldiers are standing fewer than 20 meters from the tunnels and nobody is doing anything about this.
"Egypt could stop this in less than 24 hours but there is not enough motivation."
However, the Israeli official also praised Egypt for apprehending Islamic insurgents believed to be operating in the Sinai Peninsula.
Egypt said on Friday it had arrested at least 20 Islamists suspected of extremist ideology in the Sinai, a day after Israel warned its citizens of a possible kidnap plot there.
Security services in Egypt have accused insurgents arrested over the past two years of receiving training inside Gaza to mount attacks in the Sinai targeting tourists and the Suez Canal.
Earlier this week, Israel said it had "updated and credible" information that members of the Army of Islam, a group that espouses an Al-Qaeda-like ideology, were in Sinai and planning to snatch Israeli tourists.
The warning was linked to Israel’s assassination on November 3 of Mohammed Al-Nemnem, the radical group’s number two in Gaza.
The Israeli military confirmed it was behind the deadly attack on his car in Gaza City in a joint operation with the Shin Bet internal security service, describing him as a "ticking bomb" who was planning a major attack on Israeli civilians.
Israeli intelligence, the official said, had located two Army of Islam insurgents who entered the Sinai with weapons with the aim of planning an attack.
"Now Egypt started this wave of arrests but we don’t know if these two guys have been arrested," he said.
He also blamed Hamas for being behind two rockets from Sinai which targeted the Israeli resort of Eilat and the neighboring resort of Aqaba in Jordan, which killed one person and put huge pressure on Egypt to secure the peninsula.
"The people responsible for the attacks against Eilat and Aqaba in April and July were Hamas activists," he said.
"Egypt delivered a tough message to Hamas but they didn’t do more than this. I would expect Egypt to do more than delivering tough messages."
Relations between Egypt and Hamas are at their lowest point ever, partly because of an underground barrier Egypt is building along its border with Gaza aimed at stopping the smugglers.
Earlier this year, Cairo accused Hamas gunmen of shooting dead one of its border guards.
Hamas, which believes Israel was illegitimately created on Palestinian land, fought a devastating war with the Jewish state in December 2008 and January 2009.
