ISRAELI SOLDIERS KILLED BY EGYPTIAN POLICEMAN

An Egyptian policeman crossed the border and killed three Israeli soldiers on Saturday morning, the Israeli military said, in a rare instance of deadly violence on the frontier.

The first two soldiers were killed while manning a guard post near the border in the Negev Desert, Israel said. The pair – a man and a woman belonging – had begun their shift late on Friday night. Their bodies were discovered early on Saturday morning after they did not respond to radio calls.

That triggered a manhunt during which the third soldier and the gunman were killed in a confrontation on Israeli soil hours later. A fourth soldier was lightly wounded and evacuated to hospital.

One of the victims was identified as Sgt Lia Ben Nun, 19, a combat soldier in the Bardelas Battalion, one of five mixed-gender units within Israel’s Border Defense Corps. The soldier killed in the later attack was named as 20-year-old Staff Sgt Ohad Dahan. The identity of the other soldier was not immediately made public.

The details of what happened remain vague. Egyptian sources said a group of armed men had been involved.

An Egyptian army spokesperson said that a member of its security forces chased a group of drug smugglers across the border before a gunfight ensued.

The motivation for the attack also remains unclear. Criminals sometimes smuggle drugs across the border, while Islamic militant groups are also active in the area.

The Israeli military said it was investigating the incident in full cooperation with the Egyptian army and that soldiers were conducting searches to rule out additional assailants.

Egypt was the first Arab country to sign a peace treaty with Israel in 1979 and the two countries have a stable relationship. It is one of the most serious incidents to happen on the border in decades.

Frequent attempts to smuggle drugs

Israel has in the past decade constructed a tall fence along the border, largely aimed at keeping out migrants and Islamist terrorists who operate in Egypt’s restive north Sinai.

However, there are frequent attempts to smuggle drugs over the barrier and there have been previous incidents of gunfire. Hours before the deadly shootings began on Saturday, Israeli troops reportedly foiled a smuggling plot, seizing $400,000 of contraband. That has led some to speculate that the two incidents could be connected.

Terrorist groups have also attacked Israel near the border. In the deadliest incident in August 2011, six Israeli civilians, an Israeli soldier, a police officer and five Egyptian soldiers were killed in a multi-stage attack.

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2023-06-03T15:31:41Z dg43tfdfdgfd